


Pulled From The Wreckage

by DarkmoonSigel



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angels, Angst and Humor, Hand Jobs, M/M, Porn With Plot, Wing Kink, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-10
Updated: 2013-01-22
Packaged: 2017-11-25 00:42:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 30,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/633273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkmoonSigel/pseuds/DarkmoonSigel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Angel and shameless wingfic. Dean notices that he is changing into something but is it something that he can accept? Mature for a reason for later chapters so bear with me here.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. When is it ever nothing to worry about?

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing. This was first published on Deviant Art but I am making some changes to it. No beta so all mistakes are my own. Grammar nazis, I'm telling you now, READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. The title is from a Sarah MacLachlan song called 'Angel' because I'm all sorts of witty like that. 
> 
> This story is set in Season six, after Sam gets his soul back and they know all about Eve. Other than that, I'm taking liberties with the events of the season.

In all fairness, it started out small. In their line of work and life experience, they usually didn’t deal with small. The brothers’ norm ran more toward the Apocalypse sized……literally. 

In fact, Dean only first noticed it while zoning out on a long stretch of road between Omaha, Nebraska and their next hunt somewhere off in Podunk, Nowhere. Dean did most of the driving so he got to look at the back of his hands a lot, probably more than most people should as a point of interest. Usually that wasn’t too fascinating in and of itself. At first, Dean wasn’t sure if it was the light just hitting his skin wrong or something, but it looked like his hands were clean. Like really clean. Not just the normal scrubbed and washed kind of clean after being elbow deep in monster guts, but more like the totally born again kind of clean.

Most people would not be thrown off by this or even notice for that matter, but a hunter’s skin was a living tapestry of all their fights and battles, their trials etched into their very flesh in the form of cuts, burns, and constant bruising. All the white nicks and scratches that criss crossed over his knuckles like demented pattern work were gone, the tanned skin smooth and unblemished. A quick perusal of his palms told Dean that the thick pads of his fingers were now lacking the rough calluses upon their tips and meat as well, earned from burns that he had acquired from the friction of shovel handles and firearms, and holding onto overheated Zippo lighters for too long. Hell, even his nails were looking evenly trimmed.

Dean being Dean shrugged it off. So he got touched by an angel. Big deal. For whatever reason, Castiel must have been feeling generous with his renewed angel mojo and at some point given him a holy manicure. Whatever. These sort of things happened to him and it just seemed to be his strange lot in life.

“Gee thanks, Cas. Next time can I get the matching pedicure to go with it?”, Dean grumbled out loud at the wayward angel wherever he was in heaven.

“What?”, Sam yawned as he shifted into a more comfortable position. He looked over at his brother confused, turning down the volume in the Impala. He didn’t know why Dean had to listen to Kansas at ear splitting levels. Hunters needed their hearing for their profession and besides, Sam felt like he had just missed something. Dean was a yeller. Mumbling usually meant something bad. 

“Nothing.”, Dean grunted, quickly punching Sam in the shoulder to distract him. He wasn‘t about to admit that he was paying any sort of attention to Castiel even if it only was a mocking complaint or that the angel had tried to do something nice for him, weird but nice. It was going to take him forever to get those calluses on his hands back. Grave digging was not going to be fun for a while. Not that it ever was, but blisters just added another level ’not fun’ to it. “What have I told you about touching the volume, damn it?!” 

That should have been the end of it but Dean noticed more as days went by, whether he wanted to or not. The next major observation came while he was in the shower. The brothers had stopped overnight in the bum fuck middle of Heartland nowhere at another rundown motel surrounded by seemingly endless cornfields on the edge of some small town having more than its fair share of monster activity. Their current lodgings looked like it had been built in the sixties and hadn’t been redecorated since then if the stained wallpaper was any proof. At least, the toilet worked and there was water pressure in the shower, small favors and all that. 

Dean got out of the shower, glancing up in the mirror as he did so to stare at his reflection and was taken aback by it. That wasn’t to say that he didn’t ever look at himself but Dean was definitely seeing himself for the first time though in at long time.

His skin was smooth, like baby ass smooth, similar to how he had been after Castiel had busted him out of hell. All his newly acquired scars since then from innumerable ammo, blade, claw, tooth, and nail were gone, leaving the plains of his tanned skin smooth and unblemished. Even more disturbing, his anti-possession tattoo looked like it was fading out of existence, being absorbed back into his skin. The only marking that looked like it was remaining wholly intact was one that should no longer exist. 

The angel’s handprint on his shoulder had returned with a vengeance, but even that looked altered. It had always healed strange to begin with, staying a dark reddish color instead of paling out silvery white like most burns did. Castiel had removed it the last time he had done a full body heal on Dean, right after Sam had swan dived Lucifer into the Cage. For whatever reason though it was back now and it looked more gold in color this time than just sun burned red, the raised skin of mark almost shimmered from it like his flesh had absorbed metal or stripper glitter. 

“What the hell?”, Dean muttered, tracing the dulled outline of it. As much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, Dean had missed the mark. Out of all the scarring that had been on his body, it had a special place, a meaning that Dean refused to acknowledge because that would be wrong on so many different levels for so many different reasons. He had already been to hell once and had his own special room there. No reason to really earn his way back into it.

The touch of his fingertips lingered almost fondly over the handprint despite its origin and reappearance, tingling at contact from his probing in warm bursts that traveled all through his skin like warm water flowing over the surface of it in gentle waves that clung to nerve endings. If he let himself, Dean could lose himself to the sensation, the pleasant heat that resonated from his own flesh like it was being held by another.

The hunter jumped when a sudden bang on the door rattled it almost off of its rusted hinges. “Damn it, Dean! Are you done yet?! Sometime tonight, man!”, Sam yelled through the door.

“Unknot your panties, princess. I’ll be out when I’m done!”, Dean snapped, shaking his head. It had to be Castiel’s doing. That was all. Nothing to worry about. Next time Dean saw him though, he was going to give that damn angel an earful. This so violated personal space on so many different levels. Friends, even angelic ones, did not go around hand printing each other. He would have to be careful around Sam or he would never hear the end of it. Sam seemed to live for the idea that Castiel and him were in love, which they weren’t. Nope, not at all. Not even a little. If he kept telling himself that, Dean reasoned he might even start believing it. He lied to himself about everything else, what was more thing? 

Ignoring Sam’s muttered complaints, Dean took in his new skin, winking at his reflection for good measure. “Whatever. I’m still pretty.” 

It was nothing to worry about. Dean kept telling himself that as he pulled his clothes on. It was just more thing to lie about.


	2. When voices in your head are not considered a bad thing and Sam is totally wearing his bitchface

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More changes are happening to Dean, and oh yeah, Sam is totally going to a grump by the end of this

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like earlier stated, this story is set sometime in Season Six so there might be some spoilers if you are not caught up. The angel war is going on, the boys know about Eve and the Leviathans, and Sam has his soul back. Other than that, I'm taking liberties with the rest of the season.

Things started to go even more pear shaped as time progressed to the point Dean could no longer ignore or explain away all the small changes that were happening to him. So Dean being Dean chose to hide it from himself but most of all, his brother. He didn’t know what he was turning into or why, but Dean was going to stop it, in his own and on his terms.

Dean started to accept something was legitimately happening when he started to hear the voices in his head. Not ‘drink the Kool-Aid’ kind of voices of self harm or ‘take over the world‘ kind of evil that you would expect to find whispering in your own head when you least expected it, or at least what he would expect……his life was all sorts of fucked up for that to even be a viable option. It was more like someone had left a radio on in the back of his mind that merrily kept going in and out of tune on him whenever Dean started to pay attention to it. It was strange and disconcerting at first but as time went on it became oddly pleasant to listen to. The voices were near musical in nature, singing back and forth to each other in a language that tickled the edges of Dean’s brain with its familiarity. 

One voice in particular stood out from the rest though, sounding nearer to him than all the rest for some reason. Dean heard it often enough that he was began to recognize it even when it left off its solo performance to blend back together with the rest of the chorus. He could even convince himself that it was singing to him sometimes, sounding so close but yet so far. In those moments, Dean didn’t know how he knew that the song was meant for him. It just seemed familiar, like something soft and forgiving from his childhood before it burned all up into nothing but ash and sorrow. The words, like all the other mental babbling, were nonsensical but something about the song itself struck a chord deep within Dean. It was sad yet so sweet, lonely yet resiliently hopeful, hesitantly unsure yet pure in its desire, like all love that is unrequited. 

Given all his past experience with the supernatural and the perils of ignoring the obvious, Dean knew he should have been more worried about this change in his condition than he actually was, but it wasn’t anywhere close to the noise of Hell. He still could remembered those. For all his perceived sins, he still relived every gory note in his nightmares, a symphony of razors opening up skin with bits of metal razor frozen so cold they was searing, of sweat and blood sizzling on too hot surfaces to cook into foul odor and choking smoke, and the screams that never ended because the tortured there no longer needed air to breathe or even lungs for that matter. In Hell, they could hear you scream. It was what they lived for. It meant you were still alive enough to play with.

With that in perceptive, Dean could admit that he had been through worse and the occasional dulcet music in his head was nothing to stress out about. Another expected but appreciated bonus was whenever he heard the voices singing riddles to each other in the dark of his mind, especially that one song in particular, Dean didn’t have any recurring visions of Hell when he went to sleep that night.

Dean could deal. A good night’s sleep was nothing to worry about.  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Because of fate, life, or hell, even karma, Dean couldn’t hide his ever changing condition from Sam after the damn shifter incident. Cosmic forces seemed to like making him their bitch. It left Dean wondering what he could have possibly done or who he had been in a past life to merit this kind of treatment. It was supposed to be an ‘in the bag’ hunt, easy peasy with nothing out of the ordinary, but when did things ever go smoothly for the Winchesters? Dean was willing to place bets that he had been a vicious puppy kicker in a past life.

Sneaky supernatural bastard that the shifter was, Dean and Sam found out belated that he could turn into a bear. Usually not a problem considering how much ammo the hunters were packing. The problem was though that the boys had been expecting a wolf. Luck of the draw, cause his luck was always shit when it counted, Dean was the one who got mauled and rag dolled by the bear. On the plus side Dean noted as he was being swung back and forth through the air by the sharp end of teeth, it did give Sam an excellent chance to unload a full clip of silver into the shifter, effectively ending it. Both Winchesters thought it was the end of Dean as well as he landed heavily in a soggy pile of shredded flesh. That was until all his wounds started to close up on their own without any scars or marks left behind in their wake. If not for his ruined, blood stained clothing, no one would have ever been able to guess that the hunter‘s torso had recently sported a bear bite sized hole in it. Five minutes after his close encounter with Yogi‘s evil twin, Dean was a new man…..again. 

“Dude…….that….that is not right. W-what….Why are you…?”, Sam tried to pick out some diplomatic words from his extensive vocabulary other than ‘WTF?!’. The boys were pretty well rounded with it come to unusual experiences, but instant regeneration without heavenly or hellish aid was a new one on them.

“What? Would you rather I be some bear’s picnic basket lunch?”, Dean snapped, more pissed off about the shifter munching down on him than at Sam yelling at him. Dean felt he had gotten careless and careless equated to quickly dead in their kind of world. He was too busy looking at the amount of damage done to his clothing and being pissed at himself to notice Sam‘s well established frown of concern as Dean kicked the corpse for good measure with a growl in retribution over the destruction of his favorite Aerosmith t-shirt. Fucking heathen ass shifter hating on a classic.

“No….but, Dean. How? I don’t think it’s an unreasonable question at this point.”, Sam tried again, giving his brother an exasperated look, that was not a bitchface no matter what Dean said.

“Hell if I know. It was probably Cas making an in and out house call. We’ll send him a fruit basket later. Let’s get the hell out of here. I’m freezing my barely covered ass off here. All the blood isn’t helping either. Itches like hell.”, Dean shrugged off Sam’s growing alarm, which is like throwing gasoline onto a fire in terms of lessening it.

“I think you should call Cas, and make sure it was him.”, Sam stopped Dean’s obvious escape attempt out of their conversation.

“Hell no. He’s busy with his war. We’re busy with ours. We got no time for ice cream socials, Sammy.”, Dean grunted, already starting to walk away. He heard his younger brother follow after him, his face of bitch aimed full force at Dean’s back speaking volumes of disapproval at it. 

“Don’t call me that and yeah, we do. Especially when you are up and walking around after taking that kind of damage. We have to figure out what happened or what’s happening to you.”, Sam said firmly as he watched Dean’s shoulders tense up under his stare. 

“You think I haven’t done the tests! I’m not turning into anything. Just drop it already.”, Dean exploded, his quick temper momentarily overriding his good judgment which came crashing back moments later to groan at him. Dean turned back slowly around to face his brother who looked like he was on the verge of losing his own temper.

“So when were you going to tell me that something was going on with you? Never? I know something hasn’t been right lately even if you won’t admit it to me. What have you been hiding from me? What is so bad you can‘t give me a heads up?”, Sam spoke his words slowly under an illusion of forced calm. If he started yelling, it would give Dean the out he so desperately wanted and would shamelessly take to avoid this whole confrontation. Sam couldn’t keep the hurt out of his words though and he didn‘t try to stop it either. If he had to guilt an answer out of Dean, then so be it. “After all we have been through, you still don’t trust me? Not even a little?”.

“Crap.”, Dean sighed, feeling overly tired and drawn out thin as he was overwhelmed from all sides, internally and externally. For someone who very carefully tried not to feel anything too deeply, it was unfair that he was drowning in unwanted, gut wrenchingly sharp emotions. All Dean wanted was a damn beer and a greasy burger before he called it a night. He had heard the voices again early today so he already knew his sleep was going to be Hell free tonight. He had been looking forward to it. 

“It’s not about that. Of course I trust you. I trust you with my life. I….”. God damn it, he was so inept at expressing himself, his thoughts and concerns. Dean would sometimes rather have his skin peeling off with rusty knives than talk about his feelings. The hunter shivered at that thought, memories of the Pit reminding him that he knew what that exactly felt like. On second thought, exploring uncomfortable feelings it was then. “You got enough on your own plate. I didn’t want to add to it with my own crap. It’s probably nothing anyway.”

“Dean…..When is it ever ‘nothing’ with us?”, Sam chuckled weakly. He knew how hard it was for Dean. His older brother had been raised as a soldier, living his entire life as a hunter and that kind of existence did not involve a lot of touchy feely moments or even the knowledge of how to deal with them. Sam had had for a time Jess‘s love, the solidarity of college, and a burning want for normalcy to help him understand himself. Dean only ever had the empty road, the Impala, and the weight of their father’s quest resting on his shoulders. No wonder he was so emotionally stunted. Not for the first time, Sam wondered what his brother could have been if he hadn’t been smothered in blood and responsibility, and had been given a chance at a normal life.

“Good ole Winchester luck.”, Dean snorted back in agreement before his face turned serious again. Humor didn’t ever linger long there with him. 

“I’m just worried about you. I know you’ve done all the tests but I want to do them again especially if you aren’t going to bring Cas in on this one.”, Sam told him a firm tone, one that said that answering ‘no’ was not a real option for Dean.

“Fine! Whatever! Go nuts!”, Dean threw up his hands in mock surrender as he stalked away, “Anything to shut down this chick flick moment!”  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

True to his word, Sam tried out every test that the hunters knew on Dean. Twice.

“Happy now?”, Dean growled, spitting out the burning taste of rock salt from his mouth. The cuts made from blades of all different types of metal had already healed up without any scars, leaving behind only small patches of drying blood to flake away as a reminder of their existence. The electrical burns had already healed up as well. Dean was still drenched from the holy water though and his clothing stuck grossly in places to his skin from the holy oil cause Sam had decided to be cute and think outside the box.

“No, Dean. Not at all.”, Sam sighed, shaking his head. Just short of rubbing the remains of some dead doctrined saint on his older brother, he was well and truly stumped. Sam wished deep down that he could feel elated about the fact Dean had not reacted to any of the tests negatively but some gut feeling kept him from that joy.

“At least, I’m not a monster. Don’t I get any credit for that?”, Dean popped open a couple of beers, passing one over to Sam who was still looking thoughtfully depressed about it.

“We don’t know that for sure.”, Sam pointed out. Dean rolled his eyes, chugging down most of his brew in one go. Experiencing pain and mild torture always made him thirsty.

“The glass is always half full with you isn’t it, sunshine?”, Dean muttered dryly into his beer. 

“When has the glass ever had a chance to be full when you’re around?”, Sam countered, trying a pull on his own brew though not as deeply. He wondered if this was how Dean had felt when he was soulless, that odd nervousness that lingered and made him jittery. 

“Fair enough but that makes me an alcoholic not a monster, well not the kind we hunt anyway. What now, Kojak?”, Dean yawned. He really wanted to hit the hay and get that peaceful sleep he had been so looking forward to all day. The songs in his head had been particularly good today, his own personal soloist singing him something low and soothing.

“Besides all the healing- and don’t get me wrong. The healing is great- what else have you noticed?”, Sam finally asked, willing to admit that he was at a total loss.

“My scars are gone. The anti possession tattoo too.”, Dean admitted after a moment.

“Holy shit Dean. You gotta…”, Sam started to say to have his brother cut him off with a look of disgust.

“I’ve tried, damn it. Twice! It just keeps fading out. Like my skin is absorbing it or something.”, Dean tossed out his empty bottle and immediately went for another one while Sam took in that little bit of information. Without the tattoo, he would have to depend on less reliable means of protection to avoid demon possession. 

“What else?”, Sam sighed, running his free hand through his long hair.

“Nothing.”, Dean said and immediately kicked himself for it. It came out too quickly to be convincing especially for a pair of hunters who made their living by lying on a constant basis. 

Sam’s responding glare told Dean he wasn’t buying it either. “Nothing?”, he challenged.

“There are…..”, Dean let his sentence trail off, realizing how bad what he was about to say sounded out loud. Sam wasn‘t going to leave him alone now though so he might as well go for broke. “There are these voices…….in my head but they’re not bad.”.

“How is that not bad!? Where are you getting your definition for that word?! Dean, this is way beyond merely ‘bad’!”, Sam yelled as he stared Dean down.

“Cause they’re not! Look, I know how it sounds, believe me, but they don’t tell me to do anything. I think they don‘t even know that I am listening to them.”, Dean explained quickly, “It’s like I’m listening in on some sort of conversation in another language.”.

“Another language? Like what? Latin?”, Sam tried to wrap his head around what was happening. 

“I’m not an idiot. I know what Latin sounds like, dip shit.”, Dean favored his brother with a sour look. Just because his Latin wasn’t as good as Sam’s didn’t mean he wouldn’t recognize it if he heard it. “I don’t know. It’s sounds familiar, but hell if I can remember where I’ve heard it.”

“Ok. So you are hearing voices.”, Sam dragged his hands down his face in a tired motion before pausing in strange, random thought. “You mean like Anna did?”.

“Anna was an angel in a self made witness protection program. You know I’m not part of the winged dick patrol. Just a meat suit for it.”, Dean snorted, trying not to think about the beautiful red headed angel who had gotten her tail feathers fried by Michael for all her efforts to end Sam’s life prematurely.

“Dean, that kills it. You have to call Cas. This is getting too serious to ignore.”, Sam said after a long moment of charged held silence between them. 

“I am not calling him! We can’t keep pulling him down just because we have a problem we don’t know the answer to right away.”, Dean growled out. He chucked his unfinished beer into the nearest waste bin so that he could belly flop onto an ancient motel bed that luckily didn’t collapse under his weight. Dean was going to get that well earned sleep whether Sam liked it or not. 

“This is more than just some problem! This is about you! You’re changing into God-knows-what and hearing voices. That’s not a good thing. We need to know who you are listening in on and if they are going to be pissed about it, like ‘come looking for us‘ pissed or ‘head on a spike’ pissed!”, Sam argued, not letting the subject die even after one of the participants so obviously called it quits. “Dean, for all we know, you might be possessed!”.

Dean rolled over onto his back to glare up at his overly tall kin. “Bullshit! By what!? We’ve done all the tests. Twice! I don’t know how much more salt I can eat before you’re happy.”, Dean groaned, throwing a threadbare pillow at Sam’s head to make him stop talking, even if it was only for a second. 

“If it’s not a demon, then what? Monster leech worm thing?”, Sam spit balled some more ideas out loud, tossing the pillow back.

“You’ve already electrocuted me. Carve me up with silver and the demon knife all you want if that what makes you happy but I’m not going to be a crispy critter for a third time. Anyway, I don’t think this dive’s breakers can take another hit.”, Dean growled as he snagged a cover off the end of the bed to wrap himself up into a human burrito with it. “And before you bring it up, you already know that angels need consent to wear your body as a meat suit and I’m not about to allow some asshat angel to wear me anytime soon. Not now, not ever. Now shut up and go to sleep. Or don‘t. Just whatever you do, do it quietly.”.

“You could act a little more concerned about this.”, Sam grumbled, climbing into the other bed with reluctance. He figured he had gotten all he could out of Dean tonight though. He resolved to bring this up again first thing in the morning. 

“What do you want me to do? Cry about it? Curl up in a hot bath of holy water and pray it just goes away? Yeah, right.”, Dean sighed at he leaned up out of his cocoon to turn the lights off. “I’m fine. In fact, I’ve been feeling awesome. Better than I have felt in years.”. Dean realized it was true even as he said it aloud. He had been feeling fantastic lately. None of the old aches and pains that came from their particular profession and followed them everywhere seemed to bother him anymore. He felt ten years younger with a week’s sleep under his belt and no hangover in sight. Dean couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so good. 

“Fine, but we are keeping tabs on you here on out. You let me know immediately if anything changes, no matter how small.”, Sam sighed though his tone promised that this was far from over with him.

“Yes mother.”, Dean sighed. He didn’t know why Sam was getting so worked up about this. It was nothing to worry about and if Dean had to lie to himself to go to sleep then so be it.


	3. Sleep? Who needs sleep?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sleep is for pussies and a blueberry is a fruit so everything is fine in Dean's world. Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter is short. I swear Castiel will be in this soon.

Dean’s condition continued to evolve as time went on and their hunts got progressively harder. Something strange was happening in the world of monsters and it was leaving a bad taste of weird in the brothers’ mouths now that they knew Eve was involved. Nothing like the wandering Mother of all Monsters to make a hunter miss the simplicity of the Apocalypse. 

The changes were all very gradual but nothing was missed with two pairs of wary eyes upon it now which was why it was Sam who pointed it out first that Dean was starting to sleep less and less. Neither brother slept through the night well or for very long as a general rule. Each knew hell intimately though their experiences differed considerably. Sam’s memories were blessedly tucked away behind a wall in his mind made by Death himself though the hunter occasionally got glimpses through the cracks of what may lay behind. Though few and far between, Sam’s own horrific visions involved more mind fuckery and internal soul searing. Lucifer whispered lies that sounded too much like truths in one ear( or was it truths that cut more down to his center than lies?) while Michael rage screamed continuously in the other as the pair hate banged Sam‘s being out of frustration and sheer boredom. 

Dean was nowhere as lucky or knew of such fragile mercies.

Dean’s nightmares were soaked in shades of slick red and wetness that clung, starring Alastair as his own personal ringmaster and executioner. The night terrors were stripped down versions of him, of his time still on the rack, experiencing pain so pure it rested on top of his skin along with all the other bodily fluids that were bled out from him. Alastair was dead but his memory remained in vivid detail, the likes of which left Dean choking for air while he shivered from the cold coating of sweat over his skin. Dead tired or not, he had to shower afterward. The drying tackiness reminded him too much of foulness rendered and mercy than never came.

As a result, insomnia was an old drinking buddy of theirs. It was usually accompanied by its fellow kin of night terrors and bad motel beds. As of late though, Dean didn’t trade time with any of them anymore. The six hours he might get on a really good dreamless night dwindled down to the more normal four and then to two until it was to the point, Dean’s back no longer came in contact with the rented mattress at all.  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
“Do you think you’re losing your soul?”, Sam asked casually over breakfast. The hunters were sitting across from each other at another roadside mom and pop diner, waiting impatiently for their breakfast and more refills of bad coffee. Sam had woken up again this morning to find Dean fresh as a daisy and his bed un-slept in. 

“Well, considering that I don’t feel like ganking you and everyone here just cause I’m bored, I am going to go with ‘no’.”, Dean said, giving his brother a pissy look for even asking that and making it sound like he was inquiring about something as trivial as weather. He had already given the concept some considerably thought seeing that Dean had more than enough time for it now. Porn could only fill so many hours before it just got boring and repetitive. Not even his go-to site of ‘Busty Asian Beauties’ was doing it for him anymore.

Sick of the internet, Dean spent most of his newly freed up nights working on his baby, and cleaning his guns along with rest of the arsenal, namely the widely ranged cache of weapons stored in the car’s hidden trunk. That or he went on long walks in the places where the brothers only inhabited for a day or so for a hunt. He found that though every place was generally the same, there were enough differences in them to keep it interesting for him, That and while bar hopping, he could hustled up quite a bit of cash playing poker and pool with his new tireless nature.

“That’s comforting.”, Sam said dryly, “Why don’t you do something useful then like research? That’s what I did to pass the time.”. Or so he was told. Sam’s memories about his time without a soul were still a bit sketchy at best but according to Bobby and their grandfather Samuel, he had been a hunter extraordinaire. A hunter extraordinaire with a laser focus on getting laid and no morals whatsoever but still…..

“Psssst. I got better things to do than sink to your nerdy depths.”, Dean snorted, “Anyway, my baby has never sounded so good or ran better now that I’m starting to spend some real quality time with her.”

“Your relationship with that car is disturbing.”, Sam shook his head, politely smiling up at the waitress as their food arrived in hand. Heart healthy oatmeal with a fruit cup for him and blueberry pancakes piled high with extra bacon and eggs for Dean. A pitcher of syrup came along with those steaming cakes that was destined to be decimated and absorbing into the three pancakes with more butter than was healthy for the human heart.

“You know it’s a good thing that our ’job’ is so active. You would be fat as hell by now without it.”, Sam arched a brow at his older brother. He cringed as Dean started to slather the surface of everything on his plate with syrup. In Sam’s opinion, bacon wasn’t meant to float like that. 

“Not all of us can live on hippie food and wheatgrass bullshit, bro.”, Dean glared at Sam’s oatmeal as if its existence personally offended him. The older Winchester was sure that he had thrown up things that had looked more appetizing than that bowl of brown mush. “Some of us men have real needs. Needs that only bacon and eggs can fill with a healthy dose of pancakes.”

“You should at least try to eat something with nutritional value. You know, food that is not soaked in sugar, grease, salt, and booze.”, Sam huffed, unwilling to admit even to himself how good Dean’s breakfast smelled.

“There’s blueberries in there. That’s a fruit. Quit bitching and eat your damn sludge. We gotta hit the road. I want get this salt and burn done by dinner.”, Dean said around a mouthful of fluffy goodness before washing it down with gulp of refreshed coffee. Even as he swallowed, Dean took his time gathering the next bite instead of just shoveling it in. It wasn’t like what Sam had said had bothered him, the argument timeworn and familiar. It wasn’t the food either, the pancakes were actually pretty good and Dean could even say that they were some of the best he had ever had in his life. There was nothing wrong with the food or the conversation. The thing that was off in this equation was him.

Sam finished his modest meal long before Dean, which was unusual in itself. It was made even more so when Dean pushed his still mostly full plate away from him with a frown. Sam studied the other hunter warily in return, trying to keep the shock and worry out of his face. 

If any sin could fit Dean to a T, Gluttony would be in the running neck and neck with Pride and Wrath. Dean had never been shy about fulfilling any of his bodily wants, whether it was for food, booze, or sex. While most people would not be phased in the slightest by Dean’s behavior, especially after seeing how much syrup he had poured over it, Sam was not ‘most people’ and knew that signs of an impending Apocalypse having caused and experienced one first hand. He recognized a warning sign when he saw one.

“Aren’t you going to finish that?”, Sam asked, trying to keep his tone casual but failed miserably at it as he watched Dean shift uncomfortably in his seat under his scrutiny.

“Not hungry.”, Dean grunted, glaring down at his coffee as if looking for answers or an escape plan from this conversation in its tepid surface.

“But you love pancakes.”, Sam said carefully. Dean hunched down more in answer.

“What are you? The food police? I said I’m not hungry. You got a problem with that?”, Dean snapped, white knuckling his coffee cup. Both brothers paused when they noticed fine white cracks starting to appear along the surface of the china. 

“Dean…..”, Sam began to say, knowing from experience that he should let it drop. His prodding only made his tense brother shatter the coffee cup with his bare hands. Wiping his dripping hands off with a napkin, Dean jumped up out of his seat, grateful for a reason to do so. He headed out toward the exit without another word, ignoring the stares of the other restaurant patrons.  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   
After he apologized to the waitress for the mess and paid the bill, Sam found Dean sulking in the Impala with Metallica already blaring at full volume. It was a pretty solid signal to him that Dean did not feel like talking at the moment.

On his part, Dean just wanted to lose himself in the journey and the next hunt along its way. On reflection though, his luck had always been shit. Why would today be any different as Sam slid into the passenger’s seat and turned off the music with a set bitch face expression of ‘we gotta talk and yes, we are doing this whether you like it or not‘. 

“Sam, don’t’ start.”, Dean growled out in warning as he revved up the Impala. 

“No. You’re getting worse.”, Sam said quietly, though his resolve could be clearly heard in every low word uttered.

“I feel fine. More than fine. Awesome, like I could take on a nest of vamps all by myself and not get drained.”, Dean tried to reassure, he really did. It was the truth after all. He had never felt better in his entire life than he did right now. It was like his feet could take off from the ground at any moment, he was so full of energy.

“Not sleeping and not eating does not equate into ‘fine’, at least not in the human sense of the word.”, Sam snapped, fed up with Dean’s lackadaisical attitude toward his condition. “We need to call Cas.”

“So call him.”, Dean challenged with a wide smirk. “Call him if you think he’ll answer you cause I’m not doing it.”. It was a gamble but one that Dean was willing to take. It had been proven time and time again that Castiel, the Lord’s angel of Thursday, only seemed to answer Dean’s prayers and no one else’s.

“Jerk.”, Sam spat out as he deflated, turning so that he could huff at the window. Dean didn’t know but Sam had already tried praying to Castiel weeks ago when he had first noticed Dean’s symptoms. His appeals remained unanswered by the dour, wayward angel. 

“Bitch.”, Dean counted, feeling smug as he turned up the volume so that he could sing along in childish victory.


	4. When the soothing melody of chimes sounds like shit hitting the fan......

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean thinks about Castiel. Sam finds out that electricity and his brother don't mix.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stuff happens. Still no Castiel. He's in the next chapter. First published on Deviant art and then later on fanfiction.com. This version is way better. I've made some changes and improved it.

It wasn’t that Dean didn’t want to call Castiel. There was nothing he would have liked to do more actually, the words of his prayers living on the tip of his tongue, growing more desperate and bitter the longer they stayed there unspoken. He wanted to lay all of his problems at Castiel’s feet and have the angel give him a head tilt of deep seated confusion or tell him some impressive yet indiscernible answer to his ever growing personal crisis. 

It was just……

Calling Castiel down was awkward in so many different ways. His presence was like a leaden weight slung over Dean’s entire being, the sensation of which made his stomach turn and his head dizzy. He could physically feel the angel sometimes even before he appeared, the thrill of it making all the gooseflesh on his body tighten and cool too quickly at once. Being so close to the angel, and Castiel was always so irritatingly close no matter how many conversations Dean had with him on the topic of personal space, was almost physically painful for Dean. His breathing was short, his heart beat so hard it hurt, and his tongue was either clumsy with his words or too sharp with them. 

Part of it was that Dean was so inept at talking to Castiel. The angel didn’t get half of his references so most of Dean’s light wit fell horribly flat with him. In those moments, Castiel would give him his signature head tilt of doomed social interaction. It was made all the worse because Dean actually starting to find it endearing now, but in that confused gesture of ’what is going on and why do you have to be so unnecessarily confusing?’, Dean managed to find out that he had an opening to talk to Castiel about anything and everything in an almost normal manner.

When he felt low or lonely, Dean treasured those moments as some of the best spent with the angel because Castiel listened to him and not because he had to. It was also a nice change of pace that not everything they talked about was of ‘life and death‘ importance. One of those times Dean remembered the most fondly was of the hunter spending almost an entire morning while Sam was out doing research explaining cartoons and their purpose(or lack there of) to Castiel. He drank beer and watched Scooby Doo with the baffled angel and in that moment, found that he couldn‘t have been happier doing anything else.

Dean still laughed whenever he remembered Castiel staring down the television with a perplexed yet stern look on his face like he was trying to decide if smiting was a viable option. The angel told him in that grave tone of his that ‘a dog does not talk like that and why do they feel the need to keep splitting up to look for ghosts when it is obviously a farce created by the old man introduced in the beginning.’.

It made Dean feel nice to have someone listen to him without the usual incentives of weapons, monsters, and death attacking them from all sides at once. When Castiel gave his attention to something, he did so fully, his whole being directed at its target of interest like it was the only thing within existence worth paying attention to. Initially, Dean thought it was discomforting being in that direct line of sight but gradually he found himself seeking out the angel’s consideration. It was almost entrancing to Dean now how Castiel absorbed any bit of information that he gave him whether it was trivial or not, the angel near visibly cataloging it away in his brain for further study later on. Dean often wondered if the angel actually did just that, Castiel going back to revisit his thoughts and sort through them, try to make sense of humanity as he stared off into space. Dean reasoned if he did, Castiel probably only did so to marvel at how stupid humans were, like all the other angels seemed to do. He didn’t think so though………..at least he hoped not and Dean didn’t hope for much of anything that often. 

If Dean was being honest with himself and everyone else, he was admittedly bi. It was just that most of their cases were in small communities and towns. Dean was all for instant gratification and girls were just easier to read and pick up at a moment’s notice, which in most instances, a moment‘s notice was all the time he had. It didn’t hurt matters either that the female gender just about threw themselves at him. Dean could just as easily go for some dick but he hardly bothered when pussy just presented itself so readily to him.

That all changed when an angel, his angel, walking into his life that fateful night, being wind, storm, and lightening with him. Castiel, God’s warrior angel of Thursday, the one who raised him from Perdition and marked him with more than just a scar,. Castiel, his angel…….no, the angel who dressed like a holy tax accountant in his trench coat, ill fitting suit and tie. His appearance should have been boring at best, nerdy and un-noteworthy at worst, a tired man in need of a shave and a good night’s sleep. Despite that, somehow, he was beyond the meager word of beautiful simply because Dean had no word in his vocabulary to portray him well enough…….

…….and Dean could never let himself go there, allow his wants ever to go down that way of thinking. It was never to be a possibility for so many valid reasons. First and foremost, Castiel was an angel and that made him an instant no fly zone on that alone. Dean could think of other more productive ways of torturing himself other than dreaming about how Castiel’s hands would feel against his skin exploring every inch of it or how the angel would taste and how soft his full lips would be pressed up against his own. 

They might have had a chance when Castiel was falling and even that line of thinking was something Dean wouldn’t let himself dwell on for long. Mostly because it was a small dream, something dangerous he kept in the far back of his head even from himself most of the time. For a small dream, it hurt a hell of a lot to think about. The angel had been falling, cut off from heaven, and turning more human with every passing day. It had gotten to the point where Castiel had to sleep, eat, and even take aspirin. As guilt ridden as Dean had felt about the entire situation, some traitorous part of him watched the angel’s descent with hopeful eyes, just waiting for Castiel’s feet to touch down to Earth and become a permanent fixture to it like the rest of them. No more flitting off to parts unknown looking for a god who didn’t give a damn about the world being held up at gunpoint by heaven and hell. No more long absences of being unaware if Castiel was dead or alive or even coming back. 

When Castiel fell, it would be alright then, alright if he touched, if he took, if Dean showed the former angel some of the benefits of being human. Castiel wouldn’t be some ethereal foot soldier, too pure to even consider ruining, or an emotionless robot, a cold weapon of Heaven. He would just be human like the rest of them, and have needs and wants that Dean would be more than happy to fulfill, and not feel like he was committing a sin by sullying as angel. 

And then Apocalypse had happened with an outcome no one could have laid bets on and won. Castiel died, ended by Lucifer himself. He was brought back though not as a mortal, but as a fully recharged angel. Castiel lived, and Dean wouldn’t have that any other way, but Dean still mourned his wisp of a dream, a life that they could have had together. One where Castiel became a hunter, stayed with Dean, and the two of them lived out the rest of their lives ganking evil. It was a stupid little dream that had wormed its way into the core of Dean’s psyche, hurting him in his weaker moments with its existence.

It is one of the reasons Dean had kept his promise to Sam about Lisa to attempt having a normal apple pie life. If he couldn’t have Castiel, one small concession for stopping the Apocalypse, then screw everyone else. He’d give it all up, the job, everything, so he could bury himself under normalcy. That had worked as well as jumping on a grenade naked, meaning it was messy and ineffectual. Lisa, bless her heart, had tried with the best of intentions, but Dean had just been too broken, too tired, too much of everything to fix or make it work. Sam’s sudden reappearance had been a relief for them both really and one Dean hadn’t known he’d wanted or so desperately needed. 

That being said though, it wouldn’t and didn’t stop him from looking at the angel whenever he showed up, for Dean to memorize every detail of his face and form from behind his perpetual flippant façade of bad attitude and rough words he didn‘t mean half the time. Dean could allow himself one impossible dream to warm himself in the hour of the wolf when a human was truly alone with their own terror. He was allowed one little dream, something small, impossible and warm to get him through the long night, wasn’t he?

It didn’t help in matters of adoration that Castiel seemed actually fond of him and Sam. Fond was probably not the right word for it though. Dean was fond of pie but it didn’t mean he would have chosen to fall from heaven for it like Castiel had done for them and their cause. 

In arguments with himself about such matters, Dean would tell himself to stop being delusional by trying to push human emotions or attachments on the angel, forcing some kind of deeper relationship between them than what actually existed. Like that slick shit of an angel Zachariah had put it, Castiel probably regarded Dean the same way a boot regarded an ant.

The whole thing was complicated and Dean had more than enough of that in his life. So no, he wouldn’t call Castiel until the shit really hit the fan and only then if he couldn’t help it.

It didn’t mean he didn’t want to though.  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dean found himself getting harder to kill, but in a good way. The demon pounding on him was finding this out firsthand as well and looking very uncomfortable about it. A blow to Dean’s face that should have shattered his jaw like glass, merely glanced off of it and was barely felt. Dean didn’t know who was more surprised by this, the demon or himself.

“That was a cute love tap. I’m usually all for foreplay but I’d rather get to the main event. What else you got for me, sweetheart?”, Dean grinned, cracking his knuckles as the demon started to back away from him.

“What the hell are you?”, the demon floundered, realization dawning on him that he might be totally screwed.

“Wish I knew.”, Dean shook his head as he started to wail on the demon with his bare fists. It felt good. Really good. Of late, he had been getting stronger, unnaturally so. Last week when the Impala had gotten a flat, instead of breaking out the wheel jack, which was missing having been used as an impromptu weapon on a troll, Dean had simply lifted up the car and held it steady while Sam changed out the tire. He had done all this one handed.

That in mind, Dean found out he had to be careful with his new gift. A moment’s impatience while taking off his footwear had caused the hunter to rip the thick boot leather as if it were made of paper. The major wakeup call had been him leaving his handprints in the Impala’s steering wheel after road raging at some traffic. Sam was the one who drove through major cities now while Dean fumed beside him in the passenger seat, forced to listen to Sam’s douchebag music. The younger Winchester was well versed in the ways of the car rules and was doubly quick to inflict them upon Dean to his fullest advantage of ‘Driver picks the music. Shotgun shuts his cakehole.’.

Being able to take demons out now with his bare hands almost made up for having to listen to Taylor Swift and Beiber(seriously, the demon blood must have done something horrific to Sam‘s mind or his hearing). The boost in his strength had come with a considerable amount of invulnerability as well. Dean had stopped using the normal methods of demon slaying in lieu of his fists, mostly for shits and giggles at first, just to see if he could do it. So far it was working out in his favor for once. Best of all, Dean was having a hell of a good time while doing it. He got to put a hurting on assholes demons before dropping their ass back into hell with some rapid fire chanted Latin. 

Some rabbit punches to his ribs reminded Dean that he was in a fight and that was no time to zone out no matter how boring it was. Whoever this demon was, he sucked at fighting and the person he had stolen for his vessel was pathetic. Sighing, Dean grabbed the demon’s forehead with all the good intention of just driving the black eyed bastard backward to hit the floor and knock his ass out so that the hunters could question him later for some information on Eve.

Instead, a bright white light began to shine through the demon’s facial orifices, his mouth and eyes filling up with a burning white hot light as if he had just swallowed a star from the inside out. There was a crackling of roasted flesh, the vessel’s eyes melting out of its head and the smell of ozone as Dean let go of the newly made corpse. As he let the dead man fall out of his hand mostly out of shock, Dean noticed how quiet it had suddenly gotten. The demon had been screaming up to just a second ago and the ensuing silence was unnerving. 

Hearing someone approach in the dead space, Dean quickly kicked the demon over onto its belly to hide the damage as Sam rounded a corner with a concerned expression and demon killing knife in hand. Locating Dean, he ran quickly toward him.

“Dean! Jesus, are you alright?!”, Sam yelled, looking around with the demon blade ready in hand.

“Yeah…….yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”, Dean made himself say, trying to forget about what had just happened. He had seen that kind of exorcism before and it shouldn’t have been possible for him to do it. Ever.

“Well, I didn’t hear any gun fire and crap load of screaming. Did you really just take out all these demons with your bare hands?”, Sam asked, a touch of awe in his voice as he took in the amount of destruction all around them.

Shaking off his discomfort, Dean took a moment to gloat. “Face it, bro. I’m a demon terminator now.”, he grinned smugly, “I mean I was before but now I’m on a whole new level of bad assery.”

“I don’t think‘bad assery’ is actually a word.”, Sam rolled his eyes.

“Tough titties. I’m making it one.” Laughing at Sam’s look of disgust over the blatant misuse of the English language, Dean buried the sight of the demon’s death down deep, making himself forget about it. He knew that he should tell Sam and he would. 

Soon……..maybe.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Dean found himself becoming a real connoisseur of rock salt. Morton’s had a more mineral taste to it while he found that he preferred Diamond Crystal for its more refined texture.

Like so many times before, Sam was making him go through all the tests again for the umpteenth time. Dean was starting to get really sick of it especially when he noticed Sam sacrificing the motel’s hair dryer to the cause, the younger Winchester stripping the wires with a well practiced hand. Dean felt a whole renewed wave of raw hatred for Eve and her damn ear goop worm monsters and electricity in general. Out of the all the tests, being electrocuted was his least favorite.

“I’m done.”, Dean snapped, spitting out the last of the salt as he toweled off the holy water Sam had doused him with earlier.

“Dean…..”, Sam sighed, trying to give his older brother more puppy eyes than bitch face to avoid an argument. It wasn’t like he enjoyed torturing Dean with all the tests even if he did heal up almost instantly from them. Sam felt it was necessary though to help reassure them both that Dean wasn’t about to turn into a monster. They still didn’t know what he was progressing toward but still. Better safe than horribly sorry or even dead later on. 

“I said no, damn it! I’m sick of this shit!”, Dean spat out. He was having a rough time of it. For a couple of days now, his back had been bothering him something fierce. Not unusual considering their dangerous and injury packed lifestyle but after months of being in peak condition with instant healing to boot, the aches and pains that ran up and down his spine were very noticeable.

To him, it felt as if Dean was carrying around a weight of some kind on the center of his back, making him want to hunch over at times from it. It was like he had permanently pulled a series of muscles along his spine from bowing under some unseen force. He found laying on his stomach relieved some of the phantom pressure though if he flipped over onto his back it became extricating. It also didn’t help matters either that Dean kept thinking that he saw things moving out of the corner of his eye, dashes of light too near him to be comfortable. Perusals in the mirror had shown him nothing though, and his back felt normal when he felt around and along his spine for the source. Driving around in the Impala was beginning to be a trial in patience, control, and testing his pain threshold on a near constant basis now. He could tell that Sam noticed and wanted to say something about it. Knowing Sam like he did, Dean was willing to bet that his younger brother was practically dying to talk about his issues. Like hell Dean was about to do just that. He still had his pride, damn it, and it did not allow for him to cry about some aches and pains. 

Flopping face down on the motel bed decorated with one of the ugliest coverlets the hunter had ever laid eyes upon, Dean sighed into the stained pillows. His senses dulled by the sheer momentary relief of being off his feet, Dean failed to notice Sam sneaking up on him with an exposed wire in hand or when said live wire was placed to a patch of bare skin on his back where his shirt had ridden up over his jeans. The crackle of electricity hitting skin made both of the brothers jump a little. The sonic boom that followed threw Sam clear off his feet and across the room while shattered everything made of glass in the motel room as the windows blew out from the force of it. It was a muffled explosion made of pure sound and Dean was the ground zero for it all.

With his ears still ringing from the sonic boom, the first thing that Dean was able to note was that someone’s car alarm was going off in the parking lot and that all the glass in the room was now broken, spread out over the floors and beds like razor glitter. He was also quite aware that something was on his back.

On his back and moving. 

Dean’s main concern at that point was not for himself despite his close proximity to the unknown. He needed to know where Sam was and if he was safe from it, whatever it was, and that it didn’t attack his brother if Sam was unconscious or too injured to fight it off. So Dean moved to dislodge it, whatever it was, by rolling swiftly to the side in a well practiced hunter move. He did the motion perfectly despite being shell shocked, finely honed survival instincts kicking in. Only problem was that the thing on his back moved with him.

The lone lamp that had managed somehow( possibly shielding itself with the amount of tacky it was exuding) to survive the explosion was destroyed along with the TV before Dean realized that Sam was up on his feet and yelling at him. His younger brother didn’t look too worse for wear, considering what had just happened. He was a little cut up and bloody but he didn’t look scared. Confused as all hell and dazed but not scared of whatever the hell was on Dean’s back. It took a moment longer for Dean to realize that Sam was begging him to calm down. Those words certainly didn’t make any sense to him. Something, several somethings in fact, were sitting on the middle of his back along his spine, and were attacking him. Why couldn’t Sam see that?

“Dean! Dean! Calm down and hold still! You’re only making it worse!”, Sam yelled into Dean’s face after ducking under something. Sam was keeping low to the ground as he shook his older brother by his shoulders, trying to get some sort of reaction from him other than active. Dean blinked back at him, trying to focus on his kin and his strange reaction to what was attacking them. “Please Dean, just hold still before you hurt me and yourself!”. Some part of Dean’s mind told him that he was in shock. Another told him to trust Sam as the hunter took a deep rattling breath. He forced himself to grow still and let his head clear out some of the fog that had settled there.

In that moment of forced calm and focus, the things on his back stopped moving at the same time, only twitching occasionally, enough so that Dean almost forgot about them as he tried to understand what Sam was trying to tell him. His brother sounded like he had been talking for a while and Dean wondered if he had been doing so this entire time. He felt kind of bad for not paying attention but being blown up with something clinging to his back seemed like a good excuse not to.

“What?”, Dean managed out groggily, making an effort to pay attention to whatever the hell Sam was saying to him. At least his back wasn’t hurting anymore.

“Wings! Dean, you have wings!”, Sam repeated from what felt like the billionth time in the span of a few minutes.

“I’ve got what?!”, Dean reorganized mentally, shoving past Sam in a mad dash to try and make it to the bathroom in one piece. Hopefully the mirrors in there survived the blast. Getting into the bathroom was a whole new challenge of its own but Dean managed it mostly by breaking apart the door in its frame, sending chunks of drywall flying everywhere with surprisingly little effort on his part. Inside the tiny room, Dean found that most of what was left of the mirror was cracked but he could still see his reflection well enough to gape at it.

Three pairs of wing flared out as far as they could in the tiny space and flailed about, throwing Dean off his balance to shove him into the counter as he took in the sight of his new outline. Dean grabbed one of the wings of the largest set the resting in the middle of his back, just between his shoulder blades. He dragged it forward to study the new appendage, feeling the movement of bones, tendons, and fine muscles struggling against his rough grip. The feathers covering it could have easily been made of diamond or crystals if such solid elements could be made fluid and still retain all the properties of a downy feather. So white and yet so faceted, they glittered like starbursts made of fractured light and broken rainbows. While the largest set were easily double if not triple his height in wingspan and rested between his shoulder blades, the other two sets of wings were smaller, about half the size of the primary set, with top pair just under his neck while the bottom pair sat at the small of his back.

Dean swallowed hard, taking it all in as he let go of his wing, the new appendage snapping back with an audible sound. Now that the ringing in his ears had waned, Dean noticed that the feathers made faint sounds whenever they rubbed together. It was soothing in a way, almost like hundreds of chimes in tune with each other, playing out a melody usually only known by the wind. Dean reflected he had never equated the soothing sounds of woodwinds to that of shit hitting the fan. 

“I think it’s time we called Cas.”, Dean told his wings. They chimed back at him noncommittally. He turned to the mirror for some moral support in matter.

His reflection looked worried. 

Awesome.


	5. In which Dean finds out that having wings is problematic and Castiel is the master of understatement.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean's has wings now and it's not all that's cracked up to be. Castiel shows up and things pretty much go downhill from there for Dean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm taking liberties with, well, just about everything so nothing is meant to accurate, religiously or otherwise. Just having some fun.

“I think it’s time we called Cas.”, Dean choked out, gripping the countertop hard enough to crack it. Not that he cared. Everything else was broken or fucked up. What was one more thing? Besides that, he had bigger problems right now other than some shitty porcelain that hadn’t seen the better side of bleach in decades.

“No shit.”, Sam said from the doorway with enough attitude it made Dean break out of the dull stupor he was putting himself into. 

“Oh don’t get all high and might with me! I didn’t know that this would happen!”, Dean snapped, struggling to get out of the bathroom without falling over or taking out the structure with him. The place was too small for him and all his new appendages which were not being very cooperative at the moment. Dean had to stop trying all together so that he could just focus on just staying upright. With some mental effort, he managed to fold all three pairs against his back.

“We should have known something like this would happen.”, Sam said, watching his brother struggle to walk, keep his balance, and his wings folded all at the same time. It would have been hilarious to watch if it had someone else’s life. 

“Really Sam? Cause I don’t know about you, but I couldn’t called this one.”, Dean grumbled, looking for their bags from the remains of the room. They were lucky in the sense that the brothers hadn’t bothered to unpack any of their meager possessions yet and that they checked into this dump so late at night. Shaking off most of the glass and debris, Dean grabbed both of their bags and headed toward the door, turning back only when he realized that Sam wasn’t following him. “What the hell are you waiting for? A printed invitation? Move your ass and let’s get the hell out of here before the cops show up.”.

“Point. I don’t wanna have to explain how the room blew up or why you are walking around half naked with wings either.”, Sam nodded, catching up with the program as the hunters ran to the Impala. Confused, Dean looked down at himself to find that his t-shirt was completely gone and his jeans had more than a few tears in them. As if in reaction to the thought of being unexpectedly half naked, the wings did a weird thing on their own as the new appendages unfolded themselves from his back and curved around his torso and legs to cradle themselves against his skin. Oddly enough it felt like the wings were trying to protect him. Rolling his eyes up at the strange thought, Dean didn‘t know now effective an armor made of damn feathers would be. “Throw me the keys. There is no way you’ll be able to drive with those.”, Sam said quickly, mentally calculating wing size vs. Impala space as he looked at the car.

“Crap. You’re right! How am I supposed to get in?!”, Dean griped, throwing the bags into the back seat. The keys to the Impala were still in his pocket surprisingly enough, something that Dean was grateful for. The way this night was going, Dean was surprised anything was going right for them as he slid the keys over the car to Sam’s impatient waiting hand. 

“Figure it out!”, Sam snapped, already hearing sirens somewhere off in the far distance reminding them that such things as other people still existed. The motel looked fairly deserted when they checked in earlier and appeared to be holding true to that fact, the brothers not seeing anyone peeking out of windows at the strange sight of them trying not to freak out in the parking lot. Considering it looked as though every single pane of glass had been shattered, it was safe to assume someone, somewhere had noticed that something was amiss and had felt the need to alert the proper authorities about their concerns. 

The Impala tore out onto the road with Dean sitting in the passenger’s seat window, his hands gripping the door’s frame to keep from flying off. Even with his wings folded against his back, Sam had to hold onto his legs with one hand as they both looked for side roads that would take them out of the open and further into the middle of nowhere that was the Midwest farmland. After several twists and turns at breakneck speeds, the brothers found themselves out in the middle of a field with dark woods on one side of them and a sea of half grown cornfields on the other. Apparently Sam deemed it safe enough for them to make a pit stop, the younger Winchester slamming on the brakes hard enough to make the car nearly spin out. 

Dean managed to hold on by the skin of his fingertips as the Impala came to a skidding halt on loose, wet soil, the field turning a bit muddy from all the dew thickly covering it. The hunter groaned upon noticing the indentions he had left in the car’s side from his finger pads. It was going to take him forever to get those out. 

“Damn it, Sam! It’s not Baby’s fault this happened. Don’t take it out on her.”, Dean growled at Sam. 

“Forget about the damn car!”, Sam snapped, hopping out with the police scanner in hand. Nothing was coming through on it about them though so he relaxed for a moment.

“Blasphemy!”, Dean gasped, turning back to the Impala to address it, “Baby, don’t you listen to that bad man.”.

“Dean, quit dicking around and call Cas already.”, Sam glared, “Or did you already forget that you‘re only missing the halo to complete your current look?”.

Sam had a point and there was no reason to put off the inevitable now. “Castiel! Castiel, come on in. Cas, wake and bake! Get your feathery ass down here ASAP!”.

“…”

“…”

“God damn it, Cas! ASAP means NOW!”

The brothers waited for the sound of wings with prickled anticipation and were not disappointed when it resolved itself into the familiar form of the dour angel. Said angel’s next actions not so much, Castiel springing into motion by drawing his golden blade and surging forward at a frightening speed toward Dean with a murderous intent, his expressionless face eerily still.

Only Sam would be so brave, i.e. stupid enough, to come between an angel of the Lord and his intended smiting. “Cas, stop! It’s Dean!”, Sam shouted, putting himself physically between the two.

“Jesus!”, Dean yelped, trying to come to Sam’s aid and defend himself all at the same time. He managed to flail magnificently about with all the grace of a dying goose before falling over flat on his face in a mess of feathers that chimed sweetly at him as his wings continued to flap about out of his control. Dean could see himself getting sick of that crap real quick.

“Stand down! I’m on your side!”, Dean yelled from the ground, spitting out some dirt. 

“Hello Dean.” Castiel said calmly as if he hadn’t just tried to murder him. Dean looked up to find the angel standing over him, his head already tilted to the side in inquiry. “You appear to have wings.”.

“Yeah, thanks, Nancy Drew. We figured that much out for ourselves already.”, Dean grumbled, trying to stand up. The wings had other ideas of their own on this matter though and most of them didn’t involve helping Dean in the simple endeavor of going vertical. Dean finally just gave up and got his revenge on them by flipping over onto his back so that he could lay on top of damn things in an attempt to keep the wings still. It turned out to be oddly comfortable, his bare back cushioned by warm weathers instead of night cooled, slightly moist earth and his highest pair of wings braced his neck up comfortably like some bizarre therapeutic pillow. 

“How did this come to pass? How have you done this to yourself?”, Castiel asked, his brow furrowing. In Dean’s opinion, the solemn expression did nothing to mar the angel’s attractiveness. Despite having just blown up a motel room, getting wings, and laying on his back on said wings in the middle of nowhere under a night sky of stars, Dean could already feel himself starting to relax. Castiel’s presence was like a balm to Dean’s tired, jagged soul which caused the hunter to shake his head at such a mushy thought. He reasoned out more realistically that it was probably because he knew that the angel had his back and wouldn‘t let anything happen to him, especially now that Castiel had all his angel mojo back.

“You wanna put your pig poker away before you take someone’s eye out with it?” Dean nodded to the golden sword still in the angel’s hand. “And let me just add, WHAT THE HELL?! Why did you go all smitey on me?!”.

“My apologies. I mistook you for another.”, Castiel looked down at his weapon as if just noticing it for the first time, the angel slipping it back into his trench coat to wherever he hid it. 

“Holy hell, Cas. Good to know that my wings look like someone who pisses you off.”, Dean muttered, his wings moving to do that weird covering thing again. Admittedly, Dean did feel safer even if he thought he must look like a downy human sized burrito at the moment.

“I did not attack you out of anger. I was frightened.”, Castiel admitted freely with an ease that was disconcerting. “I will not do so again now that I know it is you.”.

“I know that.”, Dean huffed from somewhere inside his wings.

“Your wing language says you do not.”, Castiel observed, his gravelly tone softer than usual. “You should not be laying on them like that in the dirt.”, he admonished lightly. The angel’s words and gentleness made Dean peek out from behind his wings to find Castiel staring down at him with an unreadable expression with his lips slightly parted. Dean wetted his own with the tip of his tongue before he realized what he was doing.

“Why would you be scared of Dean?”, Sam asked, reminding both Castiel and Dean that he was still there with them. Dean considered briefly hiding in his feathers again and just going to sleep until this whole thing blew over to save himself some embarrassment. Awesome idea but then he remembered he didn’t sleep anymore. 

Balls.

“He has six wings.”, Castiel started to explain.

“Us mud monkeys can count real good, thanks.”, Dean snorted, unable to resist making a smart ass comment. Screw it and Sam’s responding bitch face. It was his form of stress relief.

“Dean, shut up and let Cas talk.”, Sam glared at his brother, who looked unrepentant. “Sorry about him. It’s been a long night. What were you saying about six wings?”. Dean amused himself by making his wings uncurl to see if he could. Apparently he didn’t feel threatened anymore because they did what he wanted for once, small favors and all that. Dean did notice though that Castiel’s eyes were locked on the appendages’ movement, the angel leaning in and back in time to their motions through the air. Arching a brow at the Castiel in question, Dean wondered if he was doing the heavenly equivalent of shaking his ass at the angel.

“That marks Dean as part of the Seraphim. A seraph is a very powerful angel and among the highest ranking of Heaven. Because their wings are like no others, I felt I had to strike before the seraph had a chance to defend itself. The few that remain have removed themselves from the war to act as free agents or have sided with Raphael. Either position is a threat to my cause currently.”, Castiel explained, his eyes never leaving Dean as he did so. Dean met his stare head on with his own, his green eyes narrowing as they clashed with a blue that was currently a stunning shade of sapphire. He wasn’t ever sure what color of blue Castiel’s eyes actually were, the angel’s irises seemed to change up and down the color’s spectrum on whim alone. 

“Protect myself with feathers? Awesome! Why don’t I just cover myself in bubble wrap while I’m at it!”, Dean griped from the ground, flicking a wing in Castiel’s direction. He cringed when it chimed sweetly at the angel. When Castiel’s eyes widened at the gesture, Dean considered just wrapping damn things up around his body again until he mastered whatever the hell wing language was. He really hoped that he hadn’t just flipped an angel’s equivalent of the bird at Castiel or said anything else insulting. Castiel’s total lack of expression was being even harder to read than usual at the moment, carefully so. 

“Your feathers are more resistant to damage than you realize. The top pair will protect your head and neck, the middle your body, and the last your feet and ankles from attacks.”, Castiel admonished, giving Dean a stern look. 

“Just how resistant are we talking about here? Body armor? Kevlar?”, Dean ignored the angel’s ire, more in favor of blowing feathers out of his face than continuing their staring match. He found out that his flight feathers made a different sound than his down feathers. Dean was thrilled and annoyed all at the same time by this.

“If this…..Kevlar….“, Castiel paused at the unfamiliar word as if looking through his memory for some sort of reference for it. Finding none, he continued“….is effective against hellfire and everything else in creation just short of the Word of God himself, then yes.”

Dean whistled low, impressed despite his reservations, as he ran his fingers through his feathers with a new appreciation, the wings chiming back at him in low notes. “Good to know.”

“I would expect nothing less from the vessel that was meant for Michael.”, Castiel stated in grimmer tones than usual, his gaze lingering over Dean’s wings. That was never a good sign for the angel to go from consistently dour to downright bleak.

“Can you not be all cryptic for once and just tell me how do I get rid of these things? Sweet armor or not, they gotta go.”, Dean said, attempting to sit up again. To his relief, he found out that he could, the hunter rolling to his feet. Apparently his subconscious or instincts were telling his new appendages that Castiel was not a threat so they were behaving for once, the three pairs of wings folding up neatly against Dean’s back. 

Now that he was up and level, Dean noticed something in the air, his nostril flaring as he picked up a scent. Sweet rain hitting thirsty earth mingled with the tang of salt and the bite of ozone made Dean’s head feel light and slightly dizzy as he followed it, all other senses dulled in his desire to hunt down the source of that alluring scent. The trail ended with Dean bumping smack into Castiel. The hunter’s eyes flew open(when had he closed them?) to find himself chest to chest with the angel with his nose buried into the nape of Castiel’s neck, his hands gripping at the angel’s shoulders like his life depending on it. 

In shock, Dean pulled back though he left his hands in place, and even that small action was hard to do for him. He wanted to bathe himself in that scent, rub his feathers in it until he was surrounded by it and every spare inch of skin saturated with its essence. Castiel was looking back at him and though his face was void of everything except for that damnable calm, his eyes were prisms of emotion. The deep sadness that Dean found there made him release the angel and step back from him, his hands already starting to shake from the loss of contact.

“Dean? Are you alright?”, Sam asked from somewhere off to his side. His brother could have been on the other side of the moon for all Dean knew or cared. Castiel was his sole focus at the moment or at least he desperately wanted him to be, so much so Dean could taste his own desire on the tip of his tongue sweet and heavy as sin, thick with a pulse of its own……but all he was getting in return was that look of infinite sadness from his angel. That was almost as bad if not worse than disappointment or anger which were to be expected. With effort, Dean reeled himself in with a self control born of iron will and a lifetime of pain and suffering, stepping back from Castiel, reminding himself that he wasn‘t supposed to touch things he couldn‘t afford to lose. 

“Yeah, Sammie. I’m just peachy.”, Dean laughed shakily, his eyes still on the angel. “Sorry about that Cas.”

“It is alright, Dean. I understand you can not control yourself.”, Castiel looked away for the first time from Dean since his arrival. The hunter felt his heart plummet, wanting those too blue eyes back on him, needing Castiel to look at him, see him. Dean let out a sigh of relief when Castiel turned to face him again. 

“Why do you smell so good? Is this an angel thing?”, Dean asked, Castiel’s alluring scent still gnawing holes in his self control. He ignored the series of small noises Sam was making. He couldn’t afford to lose focus now to embarrassment and his brother‘s girlish tendencies. 

A rare half smile flitted across Castiel’s face before is settled back in neutrality. “That is a satisfactory way of putting it. Yes, it is an angel thing and one you should not be experiencing.”, he admitted softly.

“Great. So let’s change me back.”, Dean rubbed his hands together before running them down his face. He didn’t know how much longer he could last. Castiel was making his skin feel cold and his blood flow too hot underneath it, making Dean shiver from the contrasting sensations. 

“I am afraid that you can not.”, Castiel’s revelation broke Dean out of his complex to stare at the angel. And just like that, it was like Castiel had said the magic words that gave Dean back his self control. He hated being told he couldn’t do something. 

“What do you mean I can’t!? Why do I have the damn things in the first place!? Why is this happening to me?!”, Dean snapped, grateful for the anger. That was something familiar he could latch on to, to keep himself sane. It almost cleansing in a way to feel this sort of white hot rage mixed with defiance, the effects of which cleared Dean’s senses of Castiel’s scent. 

“What exactly happened to you? Start from the beginning and please explain it to me in detail.”, Castiel asked though the question was being more directed to Sam than Dean. The angel knew from past experience that the younger Winchester was the easier of the two to talk to. Getting Dean to speak about anything serious was like pulling teeth especially when he was upset, even if the information had the potential to help the hunter.

So it was no surprise to Castiel when Sam answered first while Dean looked more ready to kill something than talk. “It’s been going on for a couple of months now.”, Sam told him, “Instant healing and increased strength. Oh yeah, no sleeping and eating which is, you know, totally normal.”. Sam ignored Dean’s murderous glare but the older Winchester still refrained from saying anything. “He’s also been hearing voices.”.

“Voices?”, Castiel’s brow furrowed deep as he turned toward Dean to stare him down. 

“Yeah voices. Quit looking at me like that. It is not like they are telling me to do anything.”, Dean snapped, crossing his arms over his chest. He hated it when Castiel went all angel on him, like he was about to bring all of Heaven’s wrath down upon him. Dean ignored how his wings flared out with a sharp melody behind him though he did notice Castiel tracking them with narrowed eyes. 

“What do they sound like?”, Castiel asked, his words slow and careful as if he were holding back something.

“I dunno know.”, Dean shrugged, registering the new sensation of doing the once familiar gesture with heavy wings carried upon it. The new weight definitely lending something new to physics of it. “Like music….sorta. It’s in a language I don’t recognize and before you ask, no, it isn’t Latin.”.

Dean blinked in surprise when Castiel said something to him oddly familiar, a stream of words that he had only been hearing in his head up till now. “Yeah. That’s it.”, he perked up with recognition.

“Dean……That’s Enochian, the language of angels. You have more than likely listening to activities of the Host.”, Castiel said thoughtfully, the angel stepping forward to invade Dean’s personal space. The hunter found out that for once he didn’t mind if it meant he could be close to the scent that came off of Castiel’s skin, sweeter and more heady than any perfume.

“What!? But that’s impossible!”, Dean tried to mentally right himself, drowning in an alluring odor that was Castiel and weight of the information that was being laid upon him. It was a downhill battle at this point, his anger burning out under another incoming wave of salt scented rainwater. He didn’t want to argue anymore with the angel. Dean wasn’t sure what exactly he wanted to do but he was positive it didn’t involve a lot of clothing or respecting personal boundaries. 

“So should this be. I would like to check on something if you will permit it.”, Castiel said, moving even closer to Dean, making the hunter’s head spin and Dean was totally fine with that. 

“Yeah. Like what?”, Dean swallowed hard, his words coming out like a whisper. He was not liking how much he wanted Castiel to do something, anything really, to him but he was just about ready to agree to anything the angel proposed at this point.

“I want to touch your soul.”, Castiel intoned. Ok, anything but that.

“Kinky. Can you buy me dinner first?”, Dean used his unease to back away from the angel who head tilted in confusion at the hunter only to find Sam beside them now.

“Stop dicking around and let him do it.”, Sam snapped, shoving his older brother back toward Castiel. The sudden motion caused Dean’s wings to react, making Sam duck and roll as the primary pair almost took him out with a sideswipe that sang menacingly at him. 

“We don’t have time for all this touchy feely crap.”, Dean tried to talk over his wings. In truth, he didn’t know if he could handle Castiel touching him right now. If the angel smelled this good up close, there was no telling how wonderful he would feel actually touching him. That and from what he remembered, soul touching wasn’t exactly painless. Agonizing, excruciating, and evasive were the terms he had heard to describe it and he had more than enough of that kind of treatment in his lifetime, thank you very much. 

“Do you want the wings gone or not?”, Sam yelled from the ground, covering his head with his arms as Dean struggled to get himself back under control.

“Fine. Hurry up and get your freak on.”, Dean’s mouth went dry even as he said it, his mind going into panic mode. If Castiel touched his soul, would he find out about everything? Every confused stray inappropriate thought, yearning, and urge that Dean had ever had about the angel. His moment of pure panic seemed to slow down time as he watched Castiel extend his hand…….

……….and then it all went white.

Dean found himself staring at a barrier of unbelievably white that reminded the hunter momentarily of starlight, his wings forming a cocoon of glowing light all around him. 

“Ummmm Dean. You need to relax if you want to let Castiel check your soul.”, Dean could hear Sam say from what sounded a great distance away, muffled by his new protection.

“Sorry. It‘s not like these came with instruction manual or anything. ”, Dean mumbled as he tried to make his wings stand down. His success was limited, the feather loosening up enough for his head to come into view. 

“There is no need to.” Castiel said, dropping his hand back down to his side, his demeanor even more serious than before, if that were even possible.

“Why the hell not? You were all gung-ho a few seconds ago. What changed? If it’s the wings, just give me a second. I’m still learning how to control the damn things.”, Dean muttered, trying to push his new appendages away from him with his hands with little effect.

“There is simply no need to.”, Castiel stated in his obscure manner.

“Yeah, we get that. Now tell us why.”, Dean growled, finally managing to move his wings back and away with some effort and a good amount of cursing. 

“You have Grace.”, Castiel said simply, the credence and magnitude of the angel’s short statement not lost on the hunters.

“B-but……I thought only angels have that.”, Sam stammered, looking back and forth between his brother and Castiel.

“Indeed.”, the angel nodded.

“Son of a bitch!”


	6. Angel STDs? Is that really a thing?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Long and short of it, Castiel tells Dean how screwed he is. Sam tries not to laugh too hard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nothing is meant to be accurate or to be taken seriously. I also obviously own nothing.  
> Thanks for all the reviews and kudos thus far. They are appreciated.

“Son of a bitch.”, Dean swore, the words seething through his clenched teeth, “So let me get this straight, I’m turning into an angel?”. Yeah, that didn’t sound right saying it out loud to him.

“Yes.”, Castiel stated simply with a nod as if it were the most natural answer in the world. Secretly adored or not, Dean still would have liked to smack the angel upside his damn titled head sometimes for being so frigging calm in times like these.

“What the hell?! Did I catch some kinda angelic STD or something?”, Dean spazzed out, his mind racing through any possible scenario to come up with nothing. “Cas, did you give me something?”

“Perhaps.”, Castiel said in his ’tapping dancing on Dean’s last nerve’ poised manner after a moment of contemplation.

“I knew it! Wait, what?”, Dean started to rant but cut himself off at the angel’s admittance. Somehow, this conversation had taken a turn for the worse, as in terminal, it would seem. 

“It was not intentional. I left some of my own Grace within you when I remade your vessel’s form.”, Castiel explained up to a point. The truly annoying thing about angels and their answers was that they seemed to assume the person they were talking to had the same access to the same extensive amount of information and experience that they had. In Dean’s opinion because of this, angels tended to talk about everything as if it were on a ‘need to know‘ basis and most of the time, the hunters needed to know but lacked the higher clearance.

“Don’t call it that! It’s my body. You remade my body.”, Dean snapped, trying to stay focus on the point of this entire conversation as he glared at the angel who looked mournfully back at him.

“Why would you do that? Leave your Grace behind in Dean.”, Sam asked who was also staying on point as the older Winchester grimaced at his wording.

“Don’t say it like that. You make it sound all dirty.”, Dean muttered, ignoring his wings as they wrapped around him again. “I feel so used.”

“Not my fault your mind goes straight to the gutter.”, Sam rolled his eyes.

“You have to understand. Your vesse….your body was just rotten meat being absorbed back into the ground as putrid liquid by the time I brought you back from hell to this plane of existence.”, Castiel sighed with an expression Dean could only describe as vaguely confused. Sam had various faces of bitch which ranged from the mildest ‘I lost my shoe.‘ form all the way up to ‘FML, I may have inadvertently started the Apocalypse.’ while Castiel dealt in different stages of puzzlement. Dean would have to say this one was between ‘I really don’t get that reference. Please stop making it.’ and ‘Why do you insist on me trying food when you know I don’t eat, foolish mortal?’. 

“Well, don’t sugar coat it or anything.”, Dean muttered, trying not to let his imagination and memory go back six feet under. He remembered the pine box, still had nightmares about it, of being left in it because Castiel at the time didn’t know any better than not to leave a newly revived human to wake up from being dead in his own coffin or how traumatizing that might be to said human. Good thing Dean wasn’t a normal person. 

“I had to remake your entire body. That took time. While I was doing so, I harbored your soul within myself, deep within my true form to be surrounded with my Grace.”, Castiel explained, giving Dean a strange expression. If the hunter had to name the emotion behind it, he would have to say that the angel was being bashful.

“Are you trying to tell me that we had sex?”, Dean reasoned out for himself.

“No….”, was Castiel’s answer making Dean let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding.

“Jesus, don’t scare me like that…” Dean started to say, much too soon it turned out as Castiel continued to talk.

“….It was far more intimate than that.”, Castiel told the brothers. Sam started to make a choking sound that suspiciously sounded like a piss poor attempt to cover up laughter. Dean was not amused.

“I guess you came back less himenated than you originally thought.”, Sam managed out between some badly smothered chuckles.

“Shut up, Sam!”, Dean growled at the other hunter who was just about doubled over in a vain attempt to keep from flat out laughing his ass off.

“Okay. Not the answer I was looking for.”, Dean winced, ignoring Sam to turn his full attention back to Castiel. “Whoa, let’s back up here. You’re a virgin, at least you told me that you are a virgin. How the hell doesn’t that count?”. He was still reeling from the fact that at some point in time he and Castiel had had angel sex but he would be damned….again…..if it didn’t count. He had never gotten any complaints before and he sure as hell wasn’t about to start now.

“I am a virgin in the earthly sense. I have never experienced fornication while wearing a vessel before. I find human’s concept of sexual pleasure very limited though. You creatures act like you invented the act of it.”, Castiel shook his head, his lips turned up in a rare half smile of disbelief.

“You’re telling us that angels have sex and it’s better than human sex.”, Dean said flatly, the baser part of his brain remembering every messed up, religious based porno he had ever seen where the stars had worn wings and wire halos. He had been joking about whole the ‘cloud seeding’ thing.

“By the loosest concepts of your meager definition for it, perhaps. Though I doubt you would recognize it or even be able to visualize it with your limited senses.”, Castiel admitted with a small shake of his head. “The closest visual that I think you would be able to grasp would be of two stars colliding and becoming one for a period of time.”.

“Moving on, cause I don‘t think I can handle any more news about angel nookie, you remade my body from scratch. So why the hell did you leave that damn handprint on it and why is it back?”, Dean wondered, his hand reaching up to touch the now golden mark upon his shoulder.

“As you know now, the other angels wanted to take a more direct approach with you to make you give your consent into becoming Michael’s vessel.”, Castiel said, “I left the handprint infused with my Grace as a reminder to them that you were in my care and under my protection, that I had a responsibility toward you. Its return is unprecedented though. The remainder of my Grace within you may have been seeking an outlet at some point and your shoulder would have been the weakest point on your being for it, having been marked before. The subconscious part of your body would have remembered it existence even after being divinely healed.”

“So you left a hickey on me?”, Dean groaned, letting his hand drop away.

“Seriously? That’s what you got from that?”, Sam scoffed, resisting the urge to face palm.

“I have no idea what that is.”, Castiel shook his head.

“Never mind.”, Dean snorted, who didn’t feel like taking the time or running through all the awkward feelings trying to explain it. “So just take it back. Your Grace thing.”

“I can not.”, Castiel said in a firm tone.

“Well, why the hell not? Do you need my consent or something? You got it! Go nuts!”, Dean said quickly.

“What part of ‘I can not’ do you not understand?”, Castiel sighed, looking as depressed as Dean felt. “It has bonded itself to you, to the very essence of your being and has become with your core.”

Dean blinked in confusion before turning to his brother. “Sammie, are you getting any of this cause I’m lost.”.

“Well…..I think I got an idea…it’s just an idea though.”, Sam bit his bottom lip in thought, “So get this. You were supposed to be Michael’s vessel so that makes you the perfect bodily container for an angel, especially one of the most powerful, an archangel and not just any archangel, the macdaddy of all archangels, the sword of God himself. A vessel is meant to contain and store that Grace on Earth cause an angel walking around naked would burn holes in this reality, right? Everyone following me?”. Sam waited under he got a nod from Dean. Castiel just stared at him. Sam took that as a sign to continue.

“Ok, Castiel put his Grace into you and left it there with your soul. Still good?”, Sam reasoned out for himself and everyone else. 

“Yeah, so?”, Dean shook his head.

“Don’t you get it? Your body was a petri dish and Castiel’s Grace was like some bacteria added to it. Sprinkle a dash of your soul on top as some sort of nutritional supplement and leave in the dark to fester. No wonder it went nuts and grew mold.”, Sam finished, running his hands through his hair. He was met with a tense silence before Dean turned on Castiel.

“Cas! You gotta fix this and I mean now! I am not gonna turn into mold cause you got frisky with my insides.”, Dean yelled, all of his wings flaring up to help emphasize his point. It seemed to have the opposite effect on the angelthough. Instead of looking intimidated, Castiel looked mildly intrigued, his eyes widening as he took in all of Dean’s plumage, making the hunter feel like he had just done the wing equivalent of mooning. “I’m not turning into some douche bag!”, Dean finished awkwardly, trying to settle his wings back down.

“Too late.”, Sam snorted.

“Not helping, Sam. I am not going to turn into mold, damn it! How do we fix this?!”, Dean yelled. He found that he was having problems standing upright again. Apparently his wings were not happy campers because all six started to flap around again, kicking up dirt and dew. The sounds coming off of them sounded like wind chimes made of razors.

“I told you. I can not. I am sorry, Dean.”, Castiel said solemnly, the angel moving out of the way in fluid movements while Sam dived to eat earth again. Dean didn’t feel too bad about it considering Sam’s cheap potshots at his expense. Besides, dirt was all natural so it was right up Sam’s menu alley. 

“What is frigging wrong with these things? Why won’t they stop!”, Dean yelled over the music of his flailing limbs. The hunter became aware of several things all at once, the first and foremost was that Castiel was very close to him now, the pair standing almost chest to chest. The other was that the angel was reaching over his shoulders to grip his most top pair of wings where the feathers transitioned into skin. The reaction to the hold was almost instantaneous, Dean sagging forward in sudden relief. He would have keeled over in sheer relief if not for Castiel bracing up his limp body. Not that Dean was complaining. His nose was back in the crook of Castiel’s neck, devouring the scent there as he rubbed his face up and down against pale cool skin. Dean held onto the angel like he was drowning, his fingers digging into the lapels of the tan trench coat, trying to curl into the flesh underneath all the layers. All the while, Dean could feel Castiel stroking his wings, running his fingers through the shimmering feathers that sounded sweetly once again to his touch. 

“Your wings are reacting to your emotional state. You will learn over time to control it. Until then, they will be sensitive to sudden changes in your demeanor.”, Castiel said softly, his breath fluttering over Dean’s oversensitive skin. The hunter could barely keep himself from moaning out loud from breath play as he started to mouth at the angel’s throat. He was vaguely aware of his wings curving in around them both to embrace Castiel close, trapping the angel against him in a net of crystalline wings. Dean knew because he could somehow feel where every feather touched the angel’s back, sides, and something other, a place against Castiel’s back that held a static electricity that shot through Dean’s quills straight to his nerve endings. He wasn’t sure what was causing it but Dean wanted all of his feathers to do just that, right down to the littlest piece of fluff on his wings. Castiel’s words resonated within Dean’s head though, pulling him out of his enamored state.

“Cas, I don’t want to learn how. Just fix me already.”, Dean gasped, trying to regain some sort of control as he lifted his head up to drag his cheek alongside Castiel’s, feeling the angel’s semi permanent five o’clock shadow rasp against his skin. Even that felt beyond wonderful, the contrasting textures sending waves of pleasure up and down his plaint body.

“It’s not that easy. You are moss now.”, Castiel intoned, his gravely voice resonating deep down to touch Dean’s core pleasantly as his touch left off the top most pair of wings to move on down to the larger primary set. Dean’s wings enveloped around them tighter, new sensations making white star bursts appear behind Dean’s eyelids in rapid succession. It was like his feathers were wired directly into his brain and groin now and he could feel everything down to the ridges of Castiel’s fingerprints as they ran over his feathers making them chime like bells made of cut crystal. He knew his lower body was responding to the strange attention, the remains of his jeans hanging on for dear life against the pressure of his growing hard on, but Dean was too far gone to care at the moment about dull concepts such as modesty and ’oh crap, his brother was standing right beside them while he was getting his gay on with an angel of the Lord’. 

For the first time in a long time, he felt safe, so safe. Dean didn’t get to feel that way often, not with his life. It felt good. It was foreign enough feeling though that despite the warmth and pleasure, it made him feel suspicious, wary enough that he pushed back against Castiel so that he could look him in the eye. “What?”, he managed out, not even sure what he was asking anymore or if he really wanted an answer.

“I think he means…..”, Sam said from somewhere on the ground, reminding the pair that he was still there.

“I know what he means, Sam! Forget about the damn moss!”, Dean latched onto his anger like a baby to a bottle, using it to free himself from Castiel and the angel let him. He didn’t know whether to feel betrayed or grateful for it. Dean stumbled back even as every cell in his body screamed at him not to, his feathers struggling to linger over Castiel’s form and cup it with the edges of its quills. Dean’s control roared at them and the appendages shivered in compliance as they folded up neatly against Dean’s back, finally breaking contact with the angel. He kept his gaze turned toward the ground, wondering what Castiel’s expression was but lacked the courage to see it for himself. “I am not going to become a fungus, angel, or whatever. This is just like any other possession. We’ll find the right spell and bleach it out of me, cause that’s what we do.”

“You don’t understand. This is not a part that you can dispose of. You can not amputate it. It is you.”, Castiel’s voice sounded drawn but patient.

“I am not becoming an angel!”, Dean spat out the words, looking up finally to challenge Castiel’s words. He was not prepared to be met with such a look of unfathomably sorrow only an angel can give. “A-anna.”, Dean stammered, caught off guard by the expression, “She tore out her grace and became human. I can do that too.”

“Anna was a very powerful angel who existed before time was time. You are newly born. To put it into terms you will understand, you would be about as successful doing that as an infant would be trying to drive your car.”, Castiel said without a shred of doubt held in his voice. 

“Dean, you can’t do that to yourself!”, Sam started to say.

“Everyone shut up!”, Dean yelled to be met blissfully by silence. “Cas?”

“…”

“…”

“Oh for the love of, Cas you can talk. I just wanted your full attention.”

“Then why did you tell me….”

Dean somehow managed not to tear his hair out in frustration. Sometimes it was really like dealing with a baby in a trench coat. “Never mind that. You said I got Grace, right?”. Castiel nodded back. “Well, I’m saying I can’t cause I don’t believe in God so suck on that nugget of truth. You gotta believe in God to be a freaking angel and I don’t fit the bill. Can’t get into the cult without the brain washing and I didn’t drink any Kool-aid so it’ll just go away, right?”.

“I do not understand how a beverage plays into this but that is not true. You must believe in God or pray in some manner for the Grace I placed within you to react, grow, and flourish like it has.”, Castiel shook his head.

“Nope. Not a snowballs’ chance in hell. I don’t pray to anyone who doesn’t give a flying fuck about me and everyone else on the planet to let it all burn.”, Dean stated firmly, crossings his arms over his chest. He was pleased as his wings followed suit, neatly folding themselves against his back. 

“Dean.”, The older Winchester hated it when his younger brother said his name that way, in that tone. It always meant something horribly bad was about to happen to them. “I think I’ve figured it out.”

“Figured what out, Sammy?”, Dean licked his lips. They felt dry. Even if he was turning ethereal, his lips were going to be moist, damn it.

“You pray to Castiel.”, Sam said, looking more worried than usual.

“Yeah, so? So what if I do? I’m not exactly devout about.”, Dean shrugged the notion off.

“But Castiel is. He believes in God.”, Sam finished his thought.

“Son of a bitch.”, Dean swore with real feeling, “Oh shit, so I got this from cross contamination?”

“Dean, it’s not the flu. You’re an angel now.”, Sam said, his voice filled with such wonder and more than a touch of awe that it made Dean feel sick to his stomach. Sam had always been too impressed with angels even after he learned that almost all of them were asshats.

“I can’t be a freaking angel! Who’s ever heard of an angel named Dean!?”, Dean yelled at him instead. His frustration and deep seated anger at everything was being to make his hands shake. He had an angel who wouldn’t, couldn’t help him as per usual for one reason or another, and a brother putting him up on a pedestal because he had some extra appendages now. 

Dean found that he couldn’t breath properly, the air not working in and out of his lungs like it should. That in itself should have bothered him but it was more the sensation that he didn’t need to that really put him off. There was no burning in his chest, no tightness, he was not light headed or dizzy, nothing. Something broke within Dean when he realized he didn’t have to breathe anymore. White noise settled in all around Dean, making him momentarily blind and deaf.

“Dean…..”

After a while, it could have been a minute or a month, the hunter turned angel become aware that someone was saying his name over and over again. It took Dean a moment to recognize it as Castiel and that the angel sounded actually upset.

“Dean, you need to calm down….”, was what Dean managed to make out through the haze that surrounded him.

“Screw you. I am calm.”, Dean muttered, feeling his world tilt sideways again. He didn’t need to breathe anymore. That was a major whammy in his book.

“……..Or else you will end up killing Sam accidentally with your Grace when you release it.”. 

It was then that Dean realized that his wings, his skin, everything about him and of him was glowing with an inner light and that Sam had his face covered with his arms. His brother was screaming.

Dean being Dean did the first thing that came to his mind.

He left.


	7. Senseless cloud murder and other angelic activities.....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean make clouds die. He also has a long conversation with Castiel. Enjoy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the reviews and kudos. They are appreciated. :)  
> I own nothing.

Screaming felt good. Really good. The super cool air that sparkled from all the ice crystals in it and unhindered sunlight felt even better against Dean’s shining skin. Part of his mind wondered just how low Sam had jacked the motel room’s A/C. Other more rational areas of his reasoning were trying to explain away why all the clouds around him were disintegrating at a very alarming rate or why he was glowing like a damn nightlight at all. It was enough to shut Dean up and actually take note of his surroundings. 

That and there were clouds, which meant……..

“Frigging hell.”, Dean yelped as he nose dived into an all out freefall through the wild blue yonder, swift sharp air whistling through his limbs and wings as he tumbled and plummeted. Some sort of subconscious muscle memory of flight, or just plain and simple self preservation kicked in before he fell too far, sending Dean shooting back upward until he found himself floating aloft upon turbulent upper atmosphere currents with surprising ease to actually look around. 

It was high. So high that it made Dean wince as he looked down to see nothing but more cloud cover. He looked up to observe where the curls of protective atmosphere ended and the void of space began. A lifetime of watching the random science program on the Discovery channel informed Dean that he should be frozen solid from the cold and suffocating from the lack of oxygen. Dean took an experimental breath, mostly because he couldn’t remember that last time he had done so. He noted that other than the ozone borders of space and earth tasting a little dry, his actions were unnecessary. He truly didn’t need to breath any more. 

Dean considered putting his head between his knees to prevent hyperventilating from panic but it seemed kind of pointless now so he focused on other sensations or lack there of. More precisely, the lack there of. He seemed to be covered in bits of frozen atmosphere and the remains of senseless cloud murder. Dean rubbed his bare arms, knocking off some of the ice that had accrued there from his freefall. It shattered like glass to spin off, leaving the surface of his skin without so much as a burn or even a tingle. “Well, that’s different.”, Dean muttered, wondering what to do with himself now. He wasn’t exactly sure how he was going to get back down to the ground from his precariously high position in orbit. Floating down would seem like it take forever to him and he didn’t want to give some backwater yahoo a chance to take pictures of him or cause a panic by giving the normals a head’s up to the existence of angels. 

“Hello Dean.”, Castiel said from suddenly right beside him. Dean ended up flipping head over heels, literally, in surprise. “Are you all right?”. Even up here it would seem that the angel couldn’t grasp the idea of personal space. Dean didn’t even realize that he was screaming again until he noticed that Castiel was wincing from it. Another passing cloud imploded upon itself as well.

“Please stop screaming. You will draw unwanted attention from the Host to our whereabouts.”, Castiel said in his usual overly careful manner. Dean stared back at him with wide eyes, generally because he was having this conversation among the clouds and he wasn’t too hot on the whole idea of flying thing to begin with. Mostly though it was because Castiel’s wings were not only out but were totally visible to Dean. The hunter had only seen them before this moment back dropped by lightning so that they appeared to be made of shadow and moving shade.

Castiel’s wings were quite solid now and blacker then Dean could have ever imagined possible. Each feather, or at the least the idea of what a feather could be, was a warped rainbow oil slick, all the glistening colors trapped and twisted dark. It was possibly one of the most beautiful things Dean had ever laid eyes on, like a dark prism somehow crafted from fire opal, onyx and an acid trip. “Y-your wings….”, Dean stammered, his mouth suddenly going very dry with want, desire so thick it was choking him, a need to run his hands through those surreal chaos midnight plumage. All he could think about at the moment was how good it would feel to drag his fingers through glinting feathers, if they would feel cool and sharp to the touch or not. 

While the dark shade of Castiel’s wings was unexpected especially compared to the crystalline snowiness of his own, the song coming from his feathers was a bizarre mixture of the profane and the divine, the twilight notes of their movement sounding made from warped flutes made of bone and silver, low and inexplicable drawing in its appeal. Unlike the twinkling peals of cut crystal bells that was Dean’s wing music, Castiel’s own was complex yet unobtrusive to listen to. Dean would have felt jealous about it if he weren’t so fascinated. 

“I thought it would be safe to show you my wings since you harbor your own Grace now.”, Castiel said, unfurling them farther as if to display all his plumage off at once, every movement a shadowy symphony. Dean stared back in awe as he mentally floundered, at a total loss of sufficient words to express himself or his adoration for Castiel and all things dressed in lush starry night. He was a hunter, damn it, not a poet, and Dean would have given his right arm to stop tripping over his own too thick tongue. He couldn’t let himself gush over the angel’s dark wings like a little girl over a unicorn though. He still had some remainder of his pride left but he felt like he had to say something in appreciation toward them. 

“They’re beau…b…b-black. Black. Yup, black.”. If Dean ever felt like punching himself in the side of the head, it was now as he felt himself committing a grievous ‘I just kicked a puppy’ life fail. Those words were not even close to what he wanted to say. Even worse, Castiel seemed to take them personally to heart in the wrong sort of way.

“I fell. I have had doubts. I have sinned. I have killed my own kind. I have been through the hellfire of the pit itself. My wings have never been the same since I laid my hand upon you.”, Castiel said softly, the angel looking away with an unreadable expression. His wings spoke for him, the appendages lowered themselves in what Dean could only guess was a sullen expression in wing language, the song sung from them one of gloom. 

“Crap…….I didn’t mean it like that, Cas.”, Dean ran his hands through his hair in frustration, guilt threatening to over well him along with everything else going on. 

“They were once blue, many different shades of it, tipped with silver and patterned with white.”, Castiel said softly as if apologizing for the state of his wing’s color, turning his head to consider his own plumage. 

“I’m sorry.”, Dean finally managed to say, feeling miserable and sick of himself as he tried not to think about what Castiel‘s wings used to look like before he came along and screwed those up. 

Looking down or straight up(did it even count as ’up’ when you were this high?) turned out to be a bad idea though because it was either a long fall to earth from where he was standing…..floating, flying, whatever…or a bleak view of open space. The only other person here to focus on was Castiel and that was just too painful to do at the moment so Dean chose to close his eyes instead to work out his own personal turbulence of self worth. 

A gentle touch, fleeting and soft, was placed on his cheek, making Dean look up into beautiful crystal blue eyes. “It’s fine. All events considered, I prefer my wings this way. I think it suits me better. It set me apart from my brethren and reminds me of what is important.”, Castiel’s lips twitching up into that half smile Dean so rarely got to see and secretly lived for.

“Ummmm…..can I ask you a question?”, Dean hated to break the comfortable silence starting to grow between them. 

“You just did.”, Castiel pointed out, making Dean roll his eyes at him.

“Cute. You been taking lessons from Sammie? Don’t answer that. That’s not my real question. Can you tell me why I have three pairs of wings and you only seem to have the one? Unless you’re hiding them somewhere in your back pocket.”, Dean asked, nodding his head toward the angel’s singular pair. 

“Our wings are the extension of our Grace and thus must be folded back into the spaces between this reality and the next. A mere construction of material is insufficient to hide one’s wings in. I would not recommend it.”, Castiel informed Dean solemnly.

“Thanks, Cas. I would have never guessed.”, Dean said dryly who was half sure that Castiel was just fucking with him at this point. Most people and even other supernatural beings missed it, but Dean had observed Castiel’s sense of humor on more than one occasion. The angel’s delivery of his own personal brand of snark was just so bone dry that the majority tended to miss or dismiss it entirely. Once Dean had wrapped it around his head that Castiel could be funny, just in his own way, it was a quiet riot to be in on the joke and listen to the angel interact with others. Until, of course, it was directed at him. “Quit being a dick, and answer my question.”.

“It would appear that you are part of a higher order of angels. If you were among ranks, you would be considered a general. In comparison, I am just a captain, a mere foot soldier if you will. Less power equals fewer wings.”, Castiel explained with a shrug, making his wings move in an alluring manner that caught Dean‘s eye and ear. It took him a moment to realize that he was staring openly. Apparently he had already picked up some bad angel habits but Dean really couldn’t bring himself to care. 

“So I’m like a big Kahuna?”, Dean said thoughtfully, his gaze locked and tracking the movements of the black wings before him. He didn’t care if he was openly admiring Castiel’s wings or if the angel acknowledged it, which given their history was more than likely he wouldn‘t.

“I do not understand that reference.”, Castiel’s brow furrowing in confusion. 

“I’m a bad ass? Big dog in charge? Top cheese? You know, a boss?”, Dean tried to clarify. 

“In the Host and at your level, you would have command over several garrison of angels.”, Castiel answered, finally catching on.

“Sweet. Now answer me this. How did I get here?”, Dean asked, motioning to their cloud space.

“You flew.”, Castiel said simply, straight-faced.

“Thank you, Captain Obvious. How exactly?”, Dean barely managed to keep himself from face palming. He so didn’t need this kind of shit right now.

“With your wings.”, Castiel seemed to be stuck on making Dean’s life as difficult as possible. 

Dean mused to himself that Castiel must have felt like he was on a roll or something, could almost feel the angel laughing at him. Just his luck that his only source of information decided that it wanted to amuse itself by making fun of him. “Cas, we are going to have a real problem if you don’t start helping me out here.”, Dean growled, crossing his arms over his chest. He felt ridiculous floating in the sky with ripped jeans and no shirt on looking like the cover of some trashy romance novel while having this conversation.

“Then ask better questions. Obviously you did not wish to destroy Sam with your rising Grace so you sought out refuge elsewhere. It was an intelligent decision on your part, considering your true voice is starting to emerge.”, Castiel told him.

“You mean that’s why I’ve been making clouds explode?”, Dean hazarded a guess. “I sound like the ass end of a jet engine now?”

“An angel’s voice can have an interesting effect on this physical realm.”, Castiel nodded in agreement. “It will sound different to you if you let yourself hear it. It is quite beautiful even at high volume.”.

That statement alone brought Dean back to the predicament at hand, somehow making it feel all the more real. Not breathing, having a subsonic voice, seeing Castiel’s wings. He was in deep and losing sight of daylight the further in he went.

“How do I fix this?”, Dean asked, trying and failing to keep the notes of panic and desperation out of his voice. The morose look that his angel gave him did nothing to alleviate these heavy feelings.

“You do not.”, Castiel said gently. Dean would have preferred a harsher answer, a nastier tone. Something, anything he could get mad at and clear his head but Castiel floated quietly beside him with his shoulders slumped forward as if Dean’s burden was his own.

“I can’t…..I don’t want this. Can you understand that? It’s too big.”, Dean laughed out of stress and other realizations, the noise sounding sad and worn around the edges even to him. “Damn it, I’ve died, been to Hell, even survived the damn Apocalypse, and I’m telling you that this is too big for me. I can’t become an angel.”

“Why not?”, Castiel titled his head to the side and Dean found himself still loving the angel for it. He wondered if he would pick up the habit himself. He hoped not. Sam would never let him hear the end of it. 

“You wanna know why? Because I’m scared, damn it. There I said it. Happy now?”, Dean sighed, letting his arms fall to his sides as he gestured helplessly about. “I’m scared as hell.”

“Why does becoming an angel frighten you? There are some who devoutly pray for such a fate.”, Castiel asked, his tone sincere and ever so calm. Dean could almost hate him for it but further thought reminded Dean that the angel had several millennia of experience to pull from. It was just not human experience. 

“Shit Cas, I don’t know. Besides the whole civil war going on in heaven and Eve trying to take over the earth through monster worm flu, you’re right. I should be feeling just peachy about it.”, Dean ranted, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed but us humans are kinda attached to having these things called feelings and emotions. We don’t like becoming robots as any sci-fi movie will tell you.”

“You think that angels do not…….feel?”, Castiel frowned, the expression looking mildly pained on the angel’s face.

“Oh no. You’re all a roit. I‘m sure your after parties bring down the house and set the roof on fire.”, Dean rolled his eyes, his foremost thoughts going to the dead angel Uriel who in Dean‘s opinion had all the loveable personality traits of a stagnant tubeworm. “Seriously Cas, I’ve seen statues emote more emotions than you angels.”.

“We feel, feel more deeply than you would ever dare to fathom. We experience emotions more intensely than you do. If a human’s ire is a flame, in comparison an angel’s would be a forest fire covering most of what you consider the Northwest seaboard of America.”, Castiel said, looking anything but emotional. 

“I’ll believe it when I see it. As far as I’m concerned, demons are more trustworthy in that department than angels.”, Dean scoffed, shaking his head in disgust until he noticed Castiel’s taken aback expression, a mere lifting of eyebrows. Dean tried not to snort at the angel’s stunning example of animated non expression. 

“You expect a demon to lie and screw you over the first chance that it gets. That and they don’t sugar coat anything when it comes down to brass tacks.”, Dean explained, “Angels though……Shit, you guys have so much good press, any sad sack is willing to bend over backwards and take it up the ass from you flyboys before they realize just how screwed they are.”

“Is that the way you think of me as well? I have lied to you…..threatened you…..”, Castiel said hesitantly, peering over at Dean with those gorgeous eyes, their shade more azure that cerulean now. In a way, Dean was glad he didn’t need to breathe any more.

“No.”, Dean said quickly. Punch himself in the head? More like choke himself out. It appeared he doomed never to be able to say the right thing. Ever. “You’re different, Cas. You’ve always been special.”

“Is that a good thing? Being different? Special?”, Castiel whispered, leaning in to look at the hunter with a guarded expression, one that Dean wanted to erase from his handsome features. 

“Yeah, it is.”, Dean assured him quickly before he got too embarrassed to continue so he latched onto a topic he still curious about. “So tell me about when we did it. I would like to know when and where I got touched by an angel in my no-no spots.”

“It was nowhere as lewd as you are making it out to be.”, Castiel sighed, moving away again much to Dean’s dismay. “I simply found the Righteous Man already beginning to tarnish. It was necessary duty to cleanse your soul.”.

“I was a pity fuck?! Dean Winchester is nobody’s pity fuck!”, Dean snapped, down right furious now. A man had to have standards and Dean was by no means modest. When someone got boffed by him, they sure as shit knew and remembered it.

“You were in no state, physical or otherwise, to show off your sexual prowess at the time. Your soul needed purification to remove the taint of the pit and I was the only one who could do it having laid hands upon you first. It could have just as easily been Uriel or Balthazar if they had arrived before me.”, Castiel said, making Dean flinch. “What?”.

“Don’t say that.”, Dean grumbled, thanking his lucky stars and who ever else was listening that it had been Castiel and not some other angel who pulled him from the Pit. Balthazar was a perverted asshole and Uriel had been in his own personal category of douche bag. “It matters that it was you though I don’t know how much good it did. I still came back all screwed up.”

“If I had put your soul back into your body the way that I had found it, you would have never survived. Your mind would have been lost to the rack of Hell forever.”, Castiel explained, soothing Dean’s hackles back a bit.

“So, what? You screwed me back into sanity?”, Dean snorted. He reasoned there were harsher cures. 

“Crudely put. It was so much more than that. I placed you within myself, in the heart of my Grace to protect, cleanse, and heal you.”, Castiel said with that rare half smile of his that made Dean‘s heart feel like it was doing back flips in his chest.

Dean‘s mind ignored what his heart was doing as it took a turn of its own, a bad one. “Do you ever think that by doing I might have poisoned the well?”, Dean asked slowly, already feeling the venom of guilt rushing through his veins. The very idea of it made Dean feel beyond sick but the angel hadn’t fallen all on his own. Maybe, just maybe, he had been pushed.

“I do not understand. Speak plainly.”, Castiel looked at Dean sharply, his mouth set in a grim line.

“I made you fall.”, Dean clarified, his voice coming out harsher than he would have liked, “I broke something in you.”. Which would make more sense to him than Castiel choosing to fall. Dean eventually fucked up everything he touched. It was his own personal curse.

“It worked out.”, Castiel said simply, shrugging a careless movement of shoulders that he had to have learned from Dean or Sam. The very human gesture made Dean laughed out loud despite his growing fears and renewed bout of self hatred. Castiel’s smile melted the rest away, the angel looking very pleased with himself about something. “To answer your inquiry though, no. You did not make me fall. I did that all on my own because your cause was the right one to follow. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

“But…”, Dean started to argue to have fingers pressed to his lips, the touch alone effectively stilling them.

“You should not blame yourself for something that was of my choosing. You are a great man, Dean, truly the Righteous Man of proverb and destiny, but even you do not have that amount of control over heaven.”, Castiel told him gently. “Your needless guilt over the matter cheapens the choice I made. It was one of the first I completed with my own free will. It is a gift, one of many, that you gave me. It is a complicated and at times difficult gift, one that I am still learning to use, but I have never considered it a burden. I thank you for it, for giving it to me.”

In that moment between them with Castiel so close to him, looking at him with those intense too blue eyes that peered into the very depths of his soul…..Grace….whatever, touching his lips with those slim pale fingers that were cool and smooth as alabaster, Dean noticed that damnable scent again coming from Castiel. It was made all the worse being moved about back and forth by the flutter of their wings. Before he could stop himself, Dean leaned in to rest his head on Castiel’s shoulder, inhaling deeply as he pressed his nose to the angel’s throat, his wings brushing up against Castiel‘s own, making their music blend together.

“Do all angels smell as good as you do?’, Dean sighed. He hoped not. The thought of those asshats angels Uriel and Zachariah smelling as delicious as his Castiel really pissed him off for some other reason besides the obvious. His treacherous hands were already wrapping themselves around the angel, one looping around Castiel’s neck while the other rested on the curve of his waist. Dean pulled the angel closer to him before he remembered about such concepts as personal space. Dean froze in place, trying to think of how he was going to play this off. Or was until he became aware of the placement of Castiel’s own hands coming to rest upon the sloped V of his hips, the touch firm and controlling.

“No, they do not.”, Castiel said in a low voice that made Dean shiver from the heated possessiveness he heard in it.

“Why don’t you push me away? Tell me not to touch you?”, Dean murmured, running his lips over the soft pale skin of Castiel’s neck. He was going to enjoy this moment to its fullest as long as he was allowed to. 

“Because I like your scent as well.”, Castiel arched his neck, baring his throat to Dean who shuddered in want at the freely given offering.

“What do I smell like?”, Dean whispered, pressing kisses to the smooth expanse of skin laid out before him. He was being driven, though to what he had no idea. His head space was a fog of scent and lust. His wings were responding as well, his top and bottom pair curving around them to lock the pair in place together. 

“Apples…..spices…..iron….blood.”, Castiel gasped between amorous assaults, his answers sounding like they were being jerked out from somewhere deep within him, his fingers curling into Dean‘s hips. They would have bruised if Dean were still human. As it was, the sensation only sent thrills up and down Dean’s spine. 

“Why do you smell so good to me, angel? Tell me.”, Dean mouthed, his kisses getting wider and wetter with each pass.

“Because I am yours.”, Castiel moaned, his hands leaving off of Dean‘s hips to move to the small of his back, rubbing small circles there into the sun kissed skin, his clever fingers dipping under the jean‘s band to graze the curve of Dean‘s ass. The hunter shivered from it, making himself focus on Castiel’s answer with difficulty. “I have always been yours.”

“W-what?”, Dean sputtered as Castiel raised his hand to fit it over the brand on the hunter’s shoulder in answer. Light, sensation, and something far deeper, more visceral than either roared through Dean, setting his body on fire. It was a sharp pain that made him gasp that was embedded in rich pleasure, thick as chocolate and heady as aged liqueur. Whether it took a minute or a lifetime, Dean recognized it for what is was. It made him regret all the times that he had wasted when he could have been spending it with his angel.

“It’s always the quiet ones. For how long? How long have you loved me, angel? Wanted me?”, Dean gasped, arching into marrow deep twisted pain and pleasure from Castiel’s touch to his marred flesh, the mark beneath glowing golden. The hunter gave into the sensation and threw his head back with his wings, all six of them on full display and playing out a melody that sounded like it was made from plucked spider silk strings and tiny silver bells as he clung to Castiel with his hands alone. The angel held on to him back, his unshakeable hold upon him grounding Dean. 

“Since the very beginning. How could I not? You were glorious to behold ever after spending forty years in Hell. You shone like a beacon to me through all the filth of Pit.”, Castiel murmured, leaning into Dean’s taunt body, sealing the line of it with his own until their lips were the only place between them a few mere centimeters apart. He seemed unwilling or unable to break the last boundary between them and it was driving Dean crazy.

“Why didn’t you tell me? You know I’m kinda dense and a whole lot stubborn. How could you keep this from me?”, Dean shuddered as another wave of warped passion moved through him, all of it Castiel‘s. Longing, love, need, want, and so much more all throbbed together in a tightly coiled knot that made his body tighten all over, making Dean reconsider some early notions. He could definitely believe now that angels had the ability to feel. Castiel’s desire for him felt like it was tearing Dean apart from the inside out but in a pleasant sort of manner. Jealousy and possessiveness over other being’s attentions, good or bad, toward the hunter warred directly with a love what was near blinding in its sheer magnitude alone, and underneath all that ocean of emotion, lay a desire seething like a riptide that threatened to pull Dean completely under and drown him, it was so greedy for his notice and touch of flesh. 

“It was not my place. You deserved the freedom you fought for so long and so hard.”, Castiel whispered because Dean was starting to give as good as he got, the hunter pushing all of his own pent up need and longing through the connection between them, of words left unsaid because they were thought unwanted, the cutting loneliness felt in all of the angel‘s long absences, the desire to mark Castiel as his own so no other would dare touch the angel, his angel. As if in response to such a thought, his wings found Castiel’s own, their feathers working together to weave into each other’s quills. The contact was like pure warmth was being poured into the hollow of Dean’s bones and pushed outwardly through his nerves to the very surface of his skin in tiny rhythms that made every cell of his being sing hymns in the key of ecstasy. The effect was near sublime in nature as pure pleasure looping through them like a closed circuit, making both gasp from the sensation as they rocked back and forth in time to pulse. 

Dean broke first, throwing caution to the wind as he covered Castiel’s mouth with his own in a sweet kiss, only drawing back long enough to get in the last word between them before he decided to carve his sigil into Castiel‘s flesh from the inside out.

“I want you more.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh snap, cliffhanger. Why? Cause that's how I roll. "puts on sunglasses gundam style"


	8. Well, that escalated quickly....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter of the story. Dean and Castiel admit their feeling for each other......finally......only to be interrupted. Someone is about to have their ass handed to them Winchester style.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the reviews and kudos. They are very much appreciated. I obviously don't own anything. This was first published on Fanfiction and DA but this version of the story has been reworked by me and is in my humble opinion, significantly better.

A kiss.

How long had Dean dreamed about kissing his angel, the feel of Castiel’s chapped lips against his own? Of the soft press of plush flesh, of parting the seam of Castiel’s lips with the tip of his tongue to tasted the strange freshness that lay behind there. To know intimately that angel’s kisses held the flat essence of ozone, the tingle of electricity, and a coiling sweetness and spice of some mystery fruit Dean had only ever tasted before in his dreams within them.

The kiss was shorter than Dean would have liked, Castiel shoving the hunter back with such a force that it sent Dean spinning away, his wings desperately trying to coordinate with their inner workings to keep him upright. Before Dean could properly argue and vent his opinion on this coarse treatment, he was blinded by a bolt of light that came between them, sizzling the atoms of the air in its passing. Dean watched in horror as Castiel took the tail end of the hit that was meant for him, the angel screaming out in pain as he was seared by a wave of heaven fire. The harsh pain filled sound went straight to Dean’s heart, tearing it asunder as his mind reeled with the recognition of it. 

Castiel’s voice, his true voice, the one that had nearly deafened Dean back in the early days of his return from Hell to the living, was no longer the ear gutting screech that shattered glass and played merry hell with electronics like it had been in the past. Now it was a chorus, of wind moving over ocean, of rain hitting earth, of starlight moving through a vacuum. It was worthy of awe from its sheer splendor alone but what struck Dean most of all about the sound of Castiel’s voice was the aching familiarity of it, of words murmured in his ear, of songs crooned to him in dawn and twilight hours. His angel was the one who Dean had heard first above all others, whispering Enochian in his head, singing as if only to him. Castiel had been the one who had lulled him into bouts of peaceful sleep when he still could do so. Dean knew now that it had been all this time and even more so, Castiel had been right all along. 

An angel’s true voice was a thing of beauty, a perfection of sound wrought too fine for the human ear to not only comprehend but appreciate. The notes of pain it held within its ragged notes hollowed Dean out from the inside, making every nerve sing in aggrieved tune with it. He could recognized it, know it for what it was now. He knew it down to his very core and would know it anywhere this side of Heaven, Hell, and everything in-between as the cry of his angel, his mate. Something was attacking his Only, his Beloved, and that something was going to pay for it in blood and pain. 

The hunter turned angel, ever the warrior in whatever form he took, spun around to face their attacker, every muscle and fiber of his being working accordingly with itself now that it had a target to focus on. To his dismay, Dean found that they were surrounded by four other angels and worst of all, an archangel, the big bad being Raphael himself. The archangel’s six wings looked made of a silvery metal that flowed like mercury and sparked with lightening that shot off of the idea of feathers with every movement. The music of them was harsh and near overwhelmingly brutal to experience. 

The other angels with golden blades in hand sported only a single pair each, their wings sleek and in shades of white, ivory, and cream. Their plumage looked made more of sharp, bleached bone than feather, the songs coming off of them muted and dull sounding to Dean in comparison to the lulling moonlit sonata of Castiel‘s wings and the discordant thunder of Raphael‘s own opus.

Risking a quick glace via his peripheral, Dean noted that Castiel was still with them though he was clutching his arm tightly against his side, the appendage covered in Castiel’s own shining blood. Despite his injuries, the dark winged angel still looked ready to fight. Dean couldn‘t have felt more proud of him considering that their number one pain in the ass was backed by four super soldiers of Heaven’s army against their handicapped party of two, composed of Castiel bleeding out and Dean still learning his wings. All in all, it could be worse, he reflected to himself. Dean remembered having shoddier odds in the past and surviving on less than a bullet and a prayer. There was a chance, though slim that it was, that they could deal with this threat head-on and maybe even survive it. Hell, they were both angels……kinda….maybe…sorta…one and a half angels. Dean wasn’t too sure where he fell in that category yet. If they survived this, maybe Castiel could tell him how to pull a miracle out of his ass.

“No reason to get jealous, sweetheart. If you wanted a kiss that badly, all you had to do was ask.”, Dean called out with a wink to Raphael who was still wearing his female vessel and looking quite bitter about it. Dean didn’t have to feign a smirk at the archangel’s sour expression. 

“Dean Winchester. Why does it not surprise me that you have became an abomination worse than that of even your own hell spawn brother.”, Raphael looked down his vessel’s elegant nose at the pair, “And Castiel. It is of even lesser surprise to me to find the Fallen debasing themselves to this monster. It will be pleasure to destroy you both in the name of our loving Father.”.

“You talk too much for someone who’s had their ass handed to them repeatedly a pair of mud monkeys.”, Dean smirked, trying to keep his cool and provoke the archangel into making a mistake. Whether they knew it or not, in Dean’s mind Bond villains and angels seemed to live by the famous mantra ‘Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall’. In Dean’s book, there was nothing better than some dipshit big bad saving you time and legwork by telling you all their plans flatout. 

“Kill them.”, Raphael sneered, waved off his agents toward them, “I will not do them the honor.”.

Okay……..Not exactly what he was going for, but good enough, Dean thought as he watched the angels totally dismiss his presence and go after Castiel, Raphael’s agents smelling his blood and pain on the wind like any pack of predators would. The angelic foot soldiers made the mistake of turning their backs on Dean which wasn’t a good idea when he had been just a mere human. Zachariah was proof enough of that. It was an even worse move now as Dean moved forward with a speed he didn’t know he had, his mind whirling faster than the beating of his wings. Unarmed and out of his element(literally), he only had the angels’ arrogance as some sort of advantage to go on. Besides that, Dean had not idea what he was doing. Really though, when had that ever detoured a Winchester on a mission? 

Flying on pure instinct alone and fueled by a keen determination to save Castiel, Dean hit the first angel within his reach, essentially tackling it. Graceful- not in the least. Effective-oh hell yes. Dean caught the angel off guard, surprising him enough to stab the ethereal warrior through the gut with his own golden blade. As the dead angel fell away, Dean relieved him of his weapon and moved on to his next target. 

This time though the other angel was ready for him. They were both surprised when one of Dean’s primary wings swung forward and sliced through the angel’s torso as easily as if it were made of paper to the tune of ringing chimes that sounded oddly vengeful and just a touch smug. “Awesome.”, Dean grinned, though there was no real humor in the expression, just grim determination. Moving again before the destroyed angel even had time to fall away and ignoring the immaculate blood that coated his feathers and made his quills looked dipped in gold ink, Dean turned to find Castiel holding his own well enough against the other two angels. Even while one handed and unarmed, the dark winged angel ducked and dodged with a grace that was awing to watch. 

Improving the odds, Dean dove at them with all his wings angled forward like six sabers, willing to risk it all on a hunch. He crashed into one of the angel’s backs to eviscerate their enemy with his wings effortlessly, sending light filled blood everywhere in a fine mist that reminded Dean of stardust. It was terrible and messy and so damn efficient it was near addicting. Dean had no idea what he was doing or how he was doing it, but a hunter and especially a Winchester knew how to use any weapon at hand to their advantage no matter how strange it may be. Some part of Dean had always known this though. Angel were weapons, pure and simple, every part of them from head to wing tip. 

Distracted by his dying companion’s screams of agony, the last angel was easily dispatched by Castiel’s blade, the weapon appearing in hang to run its length neatly through the angel’s neck in a near decapitation. Despite their dire situation, Dean was amused to observe that Castiel killed as neat and tidy as he did anything else. 

The small hairs raising on the back of Dean’s neck and arms was all the fair warning he got before the pair were hit by another blast of white hot plasma causing Dean to move on pure instinct alone as self preservation kicked in like a linebacker’s tackle to the lobe. His wings moved over them on their own accord to encase Castiel and himself in their protection, feathers weaving together with the strident sounds of blades made of steel and diamond. The world was shut out completely as the outer layer of feather solidified into a jewel like perfection of protection. 

The tight small space between them in the cocoon was mostly white, dazzling in its purity and glittering with shards of brightly colored light that were being cast off by Dean’s feathers while darker colors were being refracted by Castiel’s wings. It was like being in the heart of a star made of black diamond and padded with velvet. “Hey, are you alright?”, Dean asked as he felt them being pelted by ethereal energy from a very angry Raphael, the archangel’s enraged onslaught heavy and bright as a meteor shower. To Dean’s surprise and great relief, the assault barely made his feathers tingle. If anything, Dean thought it kind of tickled.

“I will heal. What is happening?”, Castiel asked. His midnight wings were folded up tightly against his back though Dean’s crystal like feathers kept trying to link with his chaos onyx shaded own. 

Dean barely registered his angel’s words though. He was distracted and torn between making their wings mesh or giving into the impulse of losing himself completely to all the new sensations that where pouring in from every angle, especially when he could smell his own scent of bloody apples and iron spice mingling with Castiel’s heady allure of saltwater rain and ozone laced wet earth. It was neither the time or place for it though so for the moment, Dean kept his wings to himself as much as he could.

“Well if I had to guess, I would have to say that Raphael is throwing one hell of a bitch fit right now at us. Good thing my wings are still under warranty.”, Dean smirked. He was definitely liking how close they were to each other now, his arms wrapped around Castiel at his neck and waist, their legs intertwining together. It would have been perfect if not for the raging archangel trying to annihilate them and the wet wound in Castiel’s side coating Dean’s bare skin.

“Now that we aren’t going to die immediately, let’s see if we can patch up that bleeder up.”, Dean said, shifting the angel in his arms better to see his injury without letting go of him. Castiel expectantly looked up at him as if Dean held all the answers for him.

“I got nothing. Any ideas?”, Dean grinned helplessly. Castiel rolled his eyes with an expression of such exasperated disgust that was so humanlike it made the hunter laugh out loud despite everything going on. With a tired sounding sigh, the angel raised his hand to fit it over his own handprint, branded gold and glowing now on Dean’s shoulder to grip it tight. Instantly, they felt their connection jump and crackle, just as vivid as before but this time tempered with something other than lust. 

They needed to win this fight or Raphael would kill them for sure, but Dean wasn’t about to let that happen, not now, not ever. He pushed this sentiment back through the link, tempering it with his iron willed determination. He would not lose, not when he finally had someone to fight for other than his brother. Castiel was family now and to a Winchester, especially Dean, there was no higher accolade in the world, heaven, or hell than that honorific. 

Unable to resist Castiel’s pull and the demand of his new instincts anymore, Dean pressed a kiss to Castiel’s forehead, noticing that his angel was healed now through their connection. Hell, even his trench coat looked clean again. “So Cas…..why do you smell so good to me and why can I heal you? And have you been talking to me the entire time I was morphing in a frigging angel?”, Dean asked, not bothered at all by the fact that they were still in the middle of a firefight. Same shit, different day in his opinion. 

“Do you really think that this is the most opportune time to discuss these matters? We have other pressing issues to attend to.”, Castiel stared back at him incredulously. Dean shrugged a careless gesture before nodding his head in definite answer. If anything, this setting felt normal to him, almost like home in a way. Under fire was where Dean had most of his heart to hearts with his family after all and tended to work out a number of his issues. 

“No but when is it ever? Humor me and explain why I want to bend you over the nearest cloud in the worst possible way.”, Dean grinned, his tone teasing and light. He was finding it hard to focus on anything else but the angel in front of him, too busy wondering how Castiel would taste or even better, sound squirming underneath him. 

“It is because I am your Intended……..your mate. I have been since I pulled you from perdition.”, Castiel admitted, the angel’s words making Dean’s heart sing and certain soft flesh begin to harden. He was liking the sound of this more and more. “I marked you to protect you from others but ended up binding my entire being to you in the process.”

“So you didn’t….You don’t want this…”, Dean swallowed a lump down in his throat hard. Figures. That was just his luck after all, the universe fucking with him again. Dean’s mental vomiting was cut short by Castiel gripping his chin tight so that the Winchester had to look the angel in the eye. 

“Don’t you dare.”, Castiel said sternly in a voice worthy of smiting, “Don’t you dare diminish the sanctity of our bond with your fear and self loathing. It does not matter how or where it happened, Dean. It is a miracle that came to pass at all. No human’s soul is supposed to be receptive to an angel‘s Grace or should be able to contain it like yours did. You gripped me back as tightly as I gripped you. The difference is, on a certain level you never let go.”

“So……You’re mine?”, Dean asked hesitantly. It sounded too good to be true.

“Yours, as you are mine.”, Castiel nodded, making Dean feel like he could be fine with everything. “You heard me because I was singing to you.”. Expect for that.

“So you knew I was turning into an angel and you didn’t try to stop it?”, Dean’s brain short circuited a bit, his being not liking the sound of betrayal even if it was being committed by Castiel. The angel must of sensed his discomfort through their connection or the sudden sourness of his scent because Dean found his face being captured again and cupped by Castiel‘s hands as he just began to struggle, forcing the hunter to look steadily at him and be still. 

“Dean, I have sung to you every night since I became bound to you. It is just the first time that you have heard it.”, Castiel said softly, staring up with such wide eyed sincerity that Dean had to look away or at least try to, it was so overwhelming. When he found he could not do that because of the angel‘s iron grip on his face, he shut his eyes as Castiel’s words continued. “If I had known, I would have done everything in my power to stop it, to spare you this fate. Why did you not call to me sooner and why do you keep trying to push me away?”.

“Because……Because…”, Dean stammered, leaning forward to touch his forehead to his angel’s. He was moved by Castiel’s words beyond language of his own and felt in a way he should have already known that. Dean wished he knew how to do the angel head communication thing because he really didn’t know how to express himself in an intelligible manner ever in tender moments like this. He didn‘t know how to explain, how to word how scared he was by all this, by the purity of Castiel‘s and his own feelings for each other. “Because I am an idiot that’s why. I didn’t want to bother you with my problems cause I knew you were dealing with all the civil war crap and…..”

“And you are an idiot.”, Castiel finished for him but his tone sounded fond instead of hurt as he stroked his hunter’s barely there stubble with light fingertips. The touch made Dean remember something, the hunter catching one of Castiel’s hands. Before the angel could react, Dean pressed Castiel’s hand to his marked shoulder, focusing on all the things he could not say aloud through their connection. Dean thought of all the things he should have but never said, the lonely nights he spent thinking about his angel, the moments he could have made tender but let slip away to guard himself.   
“I’m sorry I’m so shit at words.”, Dean murmured as Castiel experienced the hunter’s regret, longing, and want for him, the angel going limp as he pressed himself into Dean’s arms. The sheer amount of love that Dean felt for him left Castiel shaking in the Winchester’s hold, the angel gasping from the intensity of it. 

Castiel’s breath moistly lapping over his skin in heated puffs and the slight movements pushed that intoxicating scent even closer than before so much so that it felt like it was being smothered into his face. Dean caught Castiel’s other hand in his own so that he could nip at the angel’s palm in mild retribution. He was delighted to find that Castiel’s skin tasted slightly sweet when he ran his tongue over the captured meat.

“Stop doing that. You’re driving me crazy.”, Dean growled, letting his teeth follow through, enough to mark but not bleed. He heard Castiel’s breath catch in response to the pressure of his porcelain. Feathers rustling all around them, Dean could feel his wings trying to force Castiel’s own to blend their plumages in with one another so that their wings overlapped. This time though, his efforts were not in vain, the angel’s inky wings working themselves in between Dean’s multiple prismatic pairs like chaotic puzzle pieces. Dean and Castiel groaned out in pleasure from it, the sensations unexpected with an overwhelming intensity that left them both panting as their Grace combined. Their wings continued to knit together, forming an even tighter barrier around them as Dean and Castiel writhed and spasmed as new connections were made between them.

“I will continue to do so until you claim me or I you.”, Castiel breathed out, the warm air of it making Dean’s face tingle and sent a warmth twisting down into his gut, the sensation of it moving straight to his groin. “Your own scent is very……stimulating.”. Giving in to his wants, the angel ended the meager space between them, the lines of their bodies flush so that Dean could feel just how ’stimulating’ his scent was to him. Dean gasped, titling his head back as their mutual hardness met, seeking friction from their contact and through their clothing. 

“Aw shit…..we have the worst timing, you know that? You do remember about the uber pissed off archangel trying to roast us alive from the inside out, right?”, Dean managed to push the words past his teeth, trying to make his mouth work properly. To his surprise, Castiel was not letting up or backing off. If anything, the mention of their imminent destruction seemed to press him more forward, Castiel’s hands running through his hair as his fingertips explored every inch of Dean’s scalp.

“Yes, but the probability of us being smited is quite high so I would rather do this now.”, Castiel answered him by thinking away all their clothing, their too warm skin finally making contact with one another, the pair groaning into each other‘s mouths from the feverish connection of flesh on flesh.

“You have got to teach me how to do that.”, Dean was able to roughly chuckle out before his mouth was claimed by Castiel with a force that was too wet and uncoordinated to be considered good. What he lacked in experience, Castiel definitely made up for in enthusiasm though. It reminded the hunter how untested the angel was with his vessel or at least doing it on this plane of existence. Mind wandering, Dean found himself wondering what it was actually like doing the nasty as a multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent. A nip on his bottom lip reminded Dean that he was very much on this plain of existence, kissing Castiel, and they were both hard to the point of painful. 

Grabbing their erections in his war callused hands, Dean reveled in the sight of Castiel reacting from it as the angel arched his back away as far as he could within the walls of their feather cocoon while he cried out in pleasure. His true voice filled the narrow space between them, bright and clear. Dean thought that the sound of it almost made up for the loss of Castiel’s lips upon his own.

Freeing one hand that was glistening slick with precum, Dean grabbed the back of Castiel’s neck to pull the angel roughly forward to him, sealing their lips in a searing rough kiss as Dean squeezed their hardness together. Their shafts were wet with their own juices, the salty smell of it mingling with their scents as they slid freely against one another seeking friction. “Damn it! I want to take you on a bed. Do this properly your first time.”, Dean rasped out as they parted, the hunter controlling his reactions better than Castiel as the angel shamelessly bucked into his hand, using his own grip on Dean’s broad shoulders as leverage.

“This is better. Angels have little use for beds.”, Castiel gasped, his too blue eyes blown dark from his open desire, his chapped lips shiny from licking them brazenly in open want. The angel looked so debauched in his lust that Dean almost came from that alone, biting the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood to maintain some sort of control.

“I love you.”, Dean whispered, mouthing the words against Castiel’s lips so that the angel could taste them fully, savoring the truth and the passion that lay within those three little words, the trio he had so rarely spoken to any living being. It was enough to bring Castiel fully, the angel screaming out his pleasure as he covered Dean’s hand with thick milky fluid. It was the most beautiful sound the hunter had ever heard, the intensity of it shaking him to the very marrow of his bones as he felt Castiel cling to his body as he thrust helplessly against Dean’s callused palm and rock solid erection. It was stunning to behold, his angel in the throes of ecstasy. 

Too soon, Dean was brought back to reality by too cool hands encircling his throbbing cock. He stared down in amazement to find his still recovering angel struggling to return the favor, his touch moving up and down Dean’s shaft at a fervent pace, holding him too tight in some places and too loose in others, uncoordinated and unpracticed. The rapturous sight was blocked from view as Castiel moved to place his lips against Dean’s own again, reminding the hunter that those virgin hands were still attached to someone.

“And I you. From the first touch when I raised you from the Pit and now until the end of days. You and I, together forever as long as God and our Grace permits.”, Castiel promised solemnly in tones far too serious for this moment, his gravely voices stroking places deep within Dean. It pulled his orgasm from him, far too early for his own liking but Dean was never one to deny himself pleasure. Castiel hungrily swallowed his cries of ecstasy, sealing their lips together so that the angel could drink in Dean’s bliss, note for note.

“Oh God….”, Dean moaned, letting his head loll back as he rode out the remainder of his release, his hips still rising and falling from it.

“You should try to avoid blasphemies, considering what you have become.”, Castiel sighed, slumping forward so that Dean could take all his weight as he mojoed away the sticky mess between them. 

“Like your Dad is going to get off his deadbeat ass to smite me. Anyway I believe in you, not him.”, Dean mused, wrapping his arms tightly around his angel, his mate. He promised himself that as soon as they got back down to earth, they were going to do this again on every surface available and in every position physically possible as long as their angelic stamina, flexibility, and healing held out.

“I find it disconcerting especially in this type of situation so please try to refrain for my sake.”, Castiel grumbled, rubbing their sandpaper cheeks together to listen to rasp of their stubble. 

“Someone’s bossy. I’ll have to remember that. Next time, I’ll make you wait, make you beg for it.”, Dean rumbled out his promise against the sweaty skin of Castiel’s throat, making the angel shiver from the vibrations on his still sensitive skin until some chiming caught his attention. Regretfully, Dean raised his head, the Grace of his wings sending his information about what was going on outside. He became aware that Raphael had paused in his attack, the tenacious archangel finally admitting to himself that his attacks hadn’t even singed a single one of Dean’s crystalline feathers.

“Now let’s go gank this son of a bitch and call it a day. I don’t know about you, but I would like to do this again and soon.”, Dean grinned, ducking in to steal a kiss from Castiel. Before the angel could react, Dean unfurled his wings and practically threw Castiel behind him. “Cas, go find yourself a shady spot. I got this.”

“Dean!”, Castiel called out in obvious anger and fear as Dean flew forward unarmed. 

Dean smiled as he faced Raphael. The expression twisted itself into a smug leer when he realized that he and Castiel were still naked and smelling heavily of sex, leaving very little to the imagination to what they had been doing together right in front of the archangel.

“You fool. I will enjoy tearing those wings from your back.”, Raphael snarled, the archangel obviously enraged as lightening fell away from his vessel and wings like sheets of water to the orchestrated song of thunder. 

“Funny I was thinking the exact same thing, bitch.”, Dean smirked as he faced the archangel. He could feel something gathering in his hand, as he somehow knew it would. Now that he was accepting the whole turning-into-an-angel thing, he found that this ever changing body of his was willing to offer him information in the form of hunches and gut urges. A healthy dose of mingled Grace and the afterglow of sex couldn’t have hurt either. Despite other people’s opinions, Sam wasn’t the only smart one in the family. Ever since Dean found out that he was Michael’s meat suit he done research on anything and everything that came his way about God’s number one badass archangel. 

It was just a hunch but one he could already feel was paying off. He was Michael’s sword alright- sheath and weapon all in one- for the archangel, a neat little package of power made of flesh, bone, and blood to contain a the ultimate warrior‘s Grace. All of which was under Dean’s conscious control now.

A curved blade made of pure light resoluted itself in Dean’s hand with its hilt attached to his wrist and palm by ropes made of shining plasma that linked in deeper than skin and bone The heavenly weapon he held was brighter than any star, sharp enough to shave the skin off of atoms, and with power so great it could split a planet in passing.

And Dean was aiming it all at Raphael.

“Mine’s bigger.”, Dean said before he darted forward faster than sound, faster than light letting his wings carry him forward the way they always wanted to, how they were designed to. Raphael screamed in rage at him, the archangel’s voice shaking the sky with his disbelief. Out of all things in heaven and on earth, Dean truly loved the arrogance of angels, especially when it worked in his favor. The conceited idiot of an archangel was so in doubt that Dean could actually hurt his vessel that Raphael didn‘t even bother to dodge or block the rather clumsy sword swing that went kind of wide. 

The hit connected though and Raphael screamed again, this time only louder and in sharp pain when the sword connected with one of his primary wings and upper shoulder, sending shining light filled blood across the sky like morbid shooting stars. Before Dean could follow through with his next attack though, Raphael gained some sense and flashed out of existence as the next strike hit vacant air. 

“Damn it! Where did he go?!”, Dean yelled at the now empty space.

“Gone. He underestimated you.”, Castiel said from close by his side. Dean could hear the smile in his angel’s voice, the hunter turned angel grinned back, the expression wide and fierce as the sword in his hand hummed and crackled with power.

“They always do.”

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

After a series of lessons that took longer than previously stated because they tended to keep getting derailed (mostly because Castiel wouldn‘t mojo back their clothing and Dean still didn‘t know how or really wanted to), Dean managed to pull his wings back into his vessel so he could walk around on earth and among mortals again incognito. His first course of action was to find his brother who had driven the Impala to Bobby’s and was staying there for some support, unspoken and unasked for.

“How you been, boy? Hear ya got yurself a halo.”, Bobby said in way of greeting, barely glancing up from his research as Dean winged in, the updraft from his arrival sending loose papers flying everywhere. He was still getting used to it but at least, he didn‘t crash into any breakable object this time, like the house itself. Dean was beginning to wonder if anything surprised the old hunter anymore as he watched Bobby lean back in his chair and pour himself another round of rotgut.

“Nice to see the important things don’t ever change.”, Dean shot back with a cheeky grin as he grabbed a glass of the cheap shit for himself.

“Hell, I figure you can heal liver damage now so why hold back or give a damn.”, Bobby shrugged, saluting the new angel with his glass before slugging it down his gullet. Dean started to roll his eyes until he really thought about it, grimacing from his own swallow of inferior whiskey but still enjoyed the burn from it.

“Touché. Where’s Sammy?”, he asked instead of giving the hunter more grief.

“Outback. So, are ya sticking around or joining the haloed dick brigade?”, Bobby asked, getting straight to the point as he poured himself another glass.

“Well considering that I’m an abomination, I don’t think they’ll be giving me my ‘member only’ jacket and the keys to Heaven’s clubhouse anytime soon.”, Dean snorted, making a study of his stolen whiskey before looking up at the old hunter, not knowing what really to expect. “Looks like you’re stuck with your very own angel.”, he added hesitantly. Bobby regarded him calmly back. 

“Now there’s a thought. Good thing we already had the Apocalypse otherwise I might think the world was ending again.”, Bobby snorted, shaking his head in mock disgust to hide his smile, “Jesus, whoever heard of an angel named Dean? They’ll let any ole idjit become an angel nowadays.”.

“Careful Bobby. Any more of that heathen talk and I’ll have to smite you.”, Dean laughed, some unnoticed held tension draining away from between his shoulders. Now he only had one other member of his family to gain acceptance from and it was the person he was dreading/wanting to see the most.

“I’d like to see you try, you little shit.” , Bobby waved him off, turning back to his research. Dean refilled his glass with bad hooch prior before he wandered out, apprehension making his pause for respite. Bobby being Bobby noticed it right away for what it was. “Go find your brother before I kick your sorry feathered ass.”

With a smile of weary gratitude at the old hunter, Dean made himself go look for Sam. Bobby watched him go, shaking his head. Like he could love that boy any less just because he had gotten himself a pair of wings.

“Idjit.”  
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Sam was easy enough to find though he was half hidden under the Impala. “Hey Sam.”, Dean said, kicking his brother in the calf to get his attention. He wasn’t about to start the whole ‘creeper angel stare down’ thing to get people’s attention.

“Dean! You’re back!”, Sam grinned, crawling out from under the Impala as he wiped some engine oil off of his hands with a rag. “When did you get in?”.

“Never mind that! What the hell do you think you are doing to my baby!?”, Dean yelled, staring in horror at the Impala’s engine. He laid his hands upon the car and bowed his head. A shimmering glow traveled through the palms of his hands to infused itself into the Impala’s paint job.

“Did you seriously just try to heal the car?”, Sam said in disbelief after a moment of silence.

“Hell yeah I did!”, Dean snapped as he dropped into the driver’s seat to rev up the newly blessed engine. “What you were doing to Baby was not only hateful but a sin. I was well within my rights.”.

“Don’t you have better things to do now?”, Sam asked wistfully and just like that, the awkward tension between them was back. Dean took a deep breathe he didn’t need any longer. He reminded himself that no one had died this time and both of them had been through worse, namely Hell itself. When you have hit the mother of all rock bottoms, it can really put things in perspective. 

“Sammy, are there still monsters to kill? Is Eve still out there being disgusting? Is the world still trying to end itself in some way like an under medicated emo?”, Dean asked, tilting his head to the side before he even realized he was doing it. Frigging angel habits.

“Well…….yeah?”, Sam answered hesitantly, shifting his weight from foot to foot. He hadn’t known what to expect when or if Dean returned, but for changing into an angel, his brother seemed really normal. 

“Then I’m going to be here for a long damn time. Total bonus now though, you got a seraph for an older brother and a kickass hunter so this is going to be a cake walk from now on.”, Dean grinned. This felt good to him. It felt right. Now if Sam was on board, it would be perfect.

“That’ll be new. Things going our way for once. I‘ll believe it when I see it.”, Sam snorted, partial in amusement but mostly in disbelief. “So, how’s Castiel?”.

“He’s good. Heaven’s in sorta a stalemate cause Cas has me in his corner now. That and Raphael’s gone into hiding with his tail tucked between his legs after the whammy I put on him.”, Dean smirked, the expression down right self-satisfied and more than a little smug. Holding back an eye roll combined with bitchface, Sam wondered to himself if his brother’s change really mattered at all. Dean was dick before so perhaps being an angel actually suited him. Shaking that thought, Sam feigned attention when he realized that Dean was still talking. Apparently, Dean still hadn’t learned the mind reading thing from Castiel, something that Sam was grateful for. “Angels aren’t too keen on negotiations. They’re more of the ultimatum type so eventually I’ll have to go back up there and kick some feathered ass. Until then, let’s go do what we do best- Gank some evil son of bitches.”

“Good to have you back.”, Sam sighed in relief, pulling his brother into am awkward side hug for the first time since he got back. Dean was still Dean, whether he had wings or not.

“Good to be back. There’s no decent liquor in heaven.”, Dean said to help bypass the chick flick moment going on between them, even as he circled his arm around Sam in a careful hold as to not break his ribs by accident. He was still getting the hang of angelic strength. In this moment it was easy, Dean feeling weak with relief. It didn’t mean he had to show it though. 

“No kidding?”, Sam laughed in surprise, letting go so that he could retrieve a couple of beer from a nearby cooler for them. He handed one off to Dean who gulped down the last of the terrible whiskey with a grimace to follow it with half of a beer. Sam was careful not to show it, but he was relieved that Dean still chose to drink and was willing to bet that the older Winchester would be indulging in pie later. A world without Dean eating too much pie in one sitting and drinking shitty beer seemed too surreal for Sam to live in. If it was wrong, he didn’t want to be right. 

“Yeah, you have to go down South for the good stuff.”, Dean shrugged, sighing in contentment over the little taste of home. He didn’t need it but that sure as shit didn’t mean he didn’t want it.

Sam watched his brother out of the corner of his eye, feeling the stress slip away from his own muscles. He was glad he found that he could smile again now that Dean was back home, very much altered from what he had been but still very much the same. “Figures.”

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The Winchesters hunted and surprisingly enough, not a whole lot changed. Angelically gifted or not, Sam still was the brains of the operation and still found most of the cases and did the most research. Their body count got better though and the healing was a nice added bonus. The only real difference was that the brothers got separate motel rooms now and with good reason.

“Hello Dean.”, The sudden greeting no longer surprised the hell out of Dean. He could hear his angel coming to him from miles away, smell his scent on the wind.

“How’s Heaven?”, Dean asked, biting back his smile as he asked that question. It amused the hell out of him that Raphael was still in hiding but he didn’t feel like a lecture about the sin of hubris from his angel.

“Peaceful and tense for now. Raphael is still trying to find a way to heal himself. There are whispers and rumors that the damage you did to him was quite considerable.”, Castiel said, with a glimmer of what Dean was going to call pride in his azure eyes.

“Well, I’m not surprised.”, Dean grinned, not caring if he got a reprimand for it now or not. He was bad ass and all of heaven knew it. That had to count for something. 

“It was all luck on your part and Raphael’s own foolish pride that made it possible.”, Castiel rolled his eyes. The sour expression somehow still managed to look fantastic on the angel’s features. 

“Aren’t you supposed to stroke my ego?”, Dean pouted, reaching out to pull Castiel to him by the lapels of his trench coat. 

“No but I can offer to stroke other things for you.”, Castiel said lightly, flitting his lips over the apples of Dean’s cheeks in a teasing manner. It was a pleasant sensation but Dean was more focused on the one moving over his lower abdomen in light circular touches, traveling down toward his groin to cup his rapidly growing erection. Gripping his angel tighter by the hips, Dean allowed his wings to unfurl from his back, the action echoed by Castiel as the room was flooding with light and dark, crystalline order and midnight chaos to the mingled song of high sweet chimes and low thrumming woodwinds.

Rain, salt, and ozone.

Apple, spice, and blood. 

“You dirty little angel.” 

 

The End


End file.
